Before Life Changed
Before I became a mum, I was a teacher.
I loved education, structure, goals, growth, and helping people move forward. I had plans for what my life would look like, what my career would look like, and who I thought I would become.
Then I became a mum.
And when my youngest son was born, everything changed.
The Beginning Of Our Story
My son was born with congenital CMV, a virus I had never even heard of before my son was born.
What makes CMV so difficult is that, for many families, there are no obvious signs during pregnancy.
That was certainly true for me.
My scans were normal and nothing major was picked up in my testing.
The only thing that ever came up was a slightly elevated white blood cell count after I got sick during pregnancy. I had a fever for one day after catching a virus from my 12 month old son, who had become sick with a fever and a runny nose after visiting an indoor playground.
They repeated the blood test not long after, and it came back clear.
So we moved on.
When my son was born, he looked healthy.
Apart from failing his newborn hearing screening, there was nothing obvious that told us something was wrong.
Failing the newborn screen meant that our son was referred to a private audiologist who completed a hearing test and diagnosed our son with mild hearing loss.
At first, he still had most of his hearing. We kept going back for more hearing tests, but the results were always inconclusive. We were told he was difficult to test because he was young and would not sit still.
But as time went on, it became clear that something bigger was happening. We were referred to a paediatrician who completed a whole array of tests, including genetic testing. In Australia, all newborns have a bloodspot test which is a sample of their blood taken immediately after birth. The blood from this test revealed that my son was born with congenital cytomegalovirus. Which meant he caught it in utero.
By the age of two, he had no babbling and we were referred for a sedated hearing test which found that he had profound hearing loss. Our family started learning Auslan and supporting my son’s learning with sign language. Our son was put on the waiting list to receive cochlear implants.
Around that same time, the seizures started. This prompted the doctors to perform an MRI which revealed a much deeper issue; a brain lesion that was caused by the CMV virus. Because I contracted the virus at such an early stage in my first trimester, it had impacted the development of my son’s brain. Leaving him with lifelong structural brain changes.
It felt like every appointment changed the picture again. Just when we thought we understood what was happening, something else would happen that forced us to rethink everything.
The Decisions We Had To Make
Because of the seizures, my son’s cochlear implant surgery had to be delayed.
This was all happening at the same time as COVID and that meant more waiting, more uncertainty, and more time sitting in that place of not knowing what the future was going to look like.
Eventually, he was implanted with a left-sided cochlear implant at the age of 3.
However, for me, the focus was never just the implants. The focus was language and connection.
I knew that if we waited for the implants to work exactly the way people hoped they would, my son could miss out on language altogether.
So we leaned hard into Auslan.
We found Deaf tutors, learned Auslan ourselves, did therapy in Auslan, and built our life around giving him as much language as possible.
That was not something the specialists suggested.
It was a decision I made as his mum because I knew he needed language, not just sound.
The implants became another tool. They were never the whole answer.
The Reality Behind The Scenes
The cochlear implant journey did not go the way we expected. His right-sided implant surgery failed twice.
There were more surgeries, more appointments, more therapy, and so many moments where it felt like progress was painfully slow.
My son still does not speak. He signs. At one point, I thought we would get the implants, do the therapy, and everything would improve in a straight line.
But it did not. Instead, I had to learn that progress can look different.
Progress looked like one new sign. One new milestone achieved. One small step after another.
The Parts Of Me I Lost
Over time, our life became filled with appointments, therapies, hearing services, seizures, surgeries, specialists, and constant decisions.
Eventually, I realised there was no way I could continue to commit to my teaching career in the way I once had.
The appointments were too frequent. The unpredictability was too great.
So I stepped away from my teaching career at the end of 2021, to support my son through his communication journey and everything that came with it.
There were seasons where I felt isolated, overwhelmed, and disconnected from the woman I used to be.
I grieved the confidence, certainty, freedom, and version of life I thought I was going to have.
What I Know Now
However, somewhere in the middle of all of that, I realised something.
Life had changed me. But it had not erased me.
Underneath the appointments, therapies, Auslan classes, seizures, school meetings, and pressure of holding everything together, there was still a part of me that wanted more.
I still wanted confidence, purpose, my own goals and projects.
That is what led me online.
I started sharing my story, and people connected with it, especially other CMV mums, parents raising deaf children and women raising children with extra needs.
For the first time in a long time, I felt less alone.
Over time, I realised that my story was not the thing holding me back. It was the thing that made me different.
Now, through Instagram, Substack, and the work I do online, I help women rebuild confidence, impact and income after life changes them.
Because I know what it feels like to think life has become too complicated, too messy, or too unpredictable to want more for yourself.
And I also know that you are still allowed to want confidence, purpose, connection, impact, and income. You are still allowed to learn and grow and build something meaningful.
