Grommets?

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I am currently on the waiting list for my 2.9ds to have grommets fitted. Has anyone else had any experiences of grommets? Nursery have mentioned he might need grommets and both hearing tests have come back below average. I've been told his speech may pick up as he's not saying a huge amount at the moment. I think I'm doing the right thing but I'm not sure.

Thank you so much for all your useful advice. Obviously, hearing better is more important than splashing around in a pool..I am inspired by the number of comments which mention speech development as a result-that would be wonderful!

Thank you for sharing all your experiences. I think DD2 is likely to be offered grommets (or probably grommet singular) at her next paediatric audiology appointment - she's 19 months now with no speech and very little receptive language, has permanent total sensorineural deafness in one ear and bad glue ear in the other which she's had almost continually since birth (it did mostly clear up for a few months at one point, but was soon back with a vengeance) and her hearing aid isn't making a huge difference. So I've been very interested to read all these posts.

Going back to yesterday and Really's suggestion that the waiting lists are just watchful waiting. In our case, we could not JOIN the list till 18months of "watchful waiting". The next 18 months was people for whom the waiting had not helped. DD also resumed swimming as soon as she was told she could, with no problems.

My dd1 aged 7 has suffered from ear infections her whole life. She had grommets fitted at 2 then again at 6. She now has terrible problems with her right ear- huge hole in the drum and more hearing loss. The left ear still has a grommet in situ but the drum looks very thin. We are waiting for an appointment with a third surgeon who will need to repair her eardrum. She can't tolerate loud noises, wind or water now due to the pain- she used to be a keen swimmer.

cupoftea that sounds awful and very similiar to my dd, did she get lots of infections after the 2nd set? Every time my dd gets a cold or any bug really the right ear drum now perforates am really concerned that she is going to be left with permenent hearing loss.

cupofteaplease and girliefriend,
I'm sorry to hear that your children have such bad problems.

OP, my DS has had two sets of grommets, put in at aged 3. He wasn't allowed to go swimming for two weeks following the op, but after that was OK to swim with ear plugs covered by a headband. We are in Australia where kids swim all the time - it's a massive thing out here. He went swimming at least once a week, sometimes every other day in summer, including in the sea, and never had any problems at all. We used these putty like plugs which are great for fitting in kids' ears as they are soft and mould to the earhole shape and more importantly don't fall out. He got one or two ear infections (not from swimming but after a cold) but having the grommets in meant that they cleared up more quickly.
No problems whatsoever with either op. My only slight complaint was that the first pair of grommets fell out really quickly so he had a longer lasting pair in the second time. The difference in both his behaviour and speech was really noticeable and I am very very glad we did it.

Best of luck with whatever you decide.

I had grommets out in at 6. It changed my life...before, i used to be so deaf id run out in front of traffic etc not hearing mum shouting to me. My hearing now is particularly sharp. One thing though: do them sooner rather than later, i was a v shy unsocialised child...happy but isolated....found it v hard to join in at nursery which i attribute to the deafness. Good luck.

The 3 month thing is to separate kids who just have a bad cold and temporary glue ear from those who actually gave a problem with it.

DS1 had watchful waiting from about 2. His hearing wasn't too bad and he wasn't being too affected by ear infections. The consultant one day just said "I'll list him for grommets" with no consultation at all, he must have been about 5? I actually refused as I felt he wasn't being affected much by it, and he had had several other operations and I didn't want to add one when I felt it wasn't necessary. We went back six months later and his hearing was fine so actually he didn't need the grommets and I made the right call.

DS2 had grommets fitted in yr1. He had had worse hearing loss but again not too many infections. He had also needed speech therapy when he was 3 for about a year. The grommets were great, he woke up straight from the operation and said "wow, I can hear super good". The difference was amazing.

With regard to swimming, we were told no swimming for 6 weeks then go for it. All was fine for about a year until we went on holiday and he got a really bad ear infection from a hotel pool, which threatened us being able to fly home. It was really yucky with pus oozing out etc.

After that bad infection we found that he couldn't really go swimming without getting an ear infection. We tried ear plugs etc but nothing seemed to stay in properly and we couldn't find a good solution.
The following year we went on a holiday in a lifetime and the consultant gave us precautionary antibiotics to take with us so that DS2 could swim. I asked what the risk was to DS2 and he said there was no risk to the ears just the pain with an infection.

So anyway they were quick and easy and for a year or so he could swim fine. After a bad infection though he didn't swim regularly for about 2 years as the grommets took 3yrs to come out. They were the right thing to do despite that though.

Good luck.

My son had grommets fitted yesterday, was told they have been put in each ear and whilst one is oozing allot the other is as though he had nothing done 🤔 and it was the better of his ears but shouldn't there be any bleeding? Or Is this normal? Thanks In advance