As Aimee prepares to take up a place at Queen's College, Cambridge to study Human Political & Social Science her parents reflect on her hearing journey.

“When our baby daughter, Aimee, did not pass her newborn hearing screening test, we thought nothing of it. It was only at the follow-up appointment six weeks later when it was confirmed that she had a bilateral moderate hearing loss, that we felt the enormity of the news.

“We had no previous experience of hearing loss and since Aimee was such a visual and engaging baby, we refused to believe she could be deaf. We sought two more medical opinions to confirm the diagnosis and finally we began the process of acceptance.

“Aimee received her first set of hearing aids when she was just five months old but we knew we wanted her to learn to listen and speak and began getting advice and information from parents of other deaf children to find out as much as we could.

“One family persuaded us to visit Auditory Verbal UK (AVUK) in Oxford to find out more about the Auditory Verbal (AV) therapy programme.

“Still raw from the shock of the diagnosis, we returned home after our first visit to AVUK, thinking we would not return due to the long journey from our home in North London. We hoped if we buried our heads in the sand everything would be alright in the end.

“But we kept hearing about the family AV therapy programme and decided to give it another try.

“The team were so professional and incredibly warm. They struck up an amazing rapport with Aimee, so much so that she looked forward to her sessions which are all play based. It was always astounding how they managed to keep the toddlers and small children engaged during the hour-long sessions.

“AV therapy gave us the tools to support Aimee to listen and acquire language. They also helped us as parents deal with hurdles and gave us strategies to use at home to communicate what we had learned during the sessions and enhance Aimee’s spoken language.

“Aimee thrived on the therapy programme and at each language assessment, she fared well above her age, a sign that she was doing the best she could be doing. As a parent, we needed to know we were doing everything possible for our child and by attending the sessions and following the programme, it gave us that comfort.

"Aimee graduated from AVUK in December 2011, when she was four-and-a-half years old and then started mainstream school. She has thrived ever since and is a bubbly, confident young lady now leaving home and starting her degree at Cambridge University.

"I cannot imagine where both Aimee and us as a family would be had now had it not been for AV therapy and in particular AVUK’s guidance and support. We couldn’t be more proud of her and we are so excited for her future.”

James and Susan – Aimee’s Parents