And it had nothing to do with bugs and snakes.
It’s been an emotional few weeks for Chrissie Swan. The 41-year-old mother, TV personality, former radio host and one of our very favourite people is currently one of the celebrities on I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here, but it’s been nothing short of a tough ride.
In last night’s episode, Chrissie spoke openly and frankly about her son’s hearing impairment.
Kit, Chrissie’s second child with partner Chris Saville, was two years old when they realised he couldn’t hear.
Read more: Chrissie Swan’s most honest interview yet: “It was hard to take.”
“He wasn’t talking, he wasn’t learning to talk,” Chrissie said on the show.
“He wasn’t saying ‘mum’ or anything.”
Doctors later diagnosed Kit with 60 per cent hearing in both ears.
The family spoke to Kit through a form of lip-reading until he underwent corrective surgery, which fixed the problem.
Chrissie described it as “amazing”.
“When he came out of surgery… it was amazing because we just got used to him not hearing us at all. He was always lip-reading and we didn’t realise,” she said.
“He was laying on me when he came out and I said something to me and he looked up at me and could hear it. It was amazing.
“I said to Chris ‘oh my God, he can hear me — he can hear what I’m saying!’”
What a beautiful moment, Chrissie. We’re so happy for you and your family.
I’m a Celebrity airs Sunday through Thursday on Channel 10.
Top Comments
Channel Ten should be sued under the Fair Trading Act for including the word "celebrities" in the title of this atrocity.
More appropriate: "I'm a Z grade personality desperate for attention and relevance, willing to debase myself on television for the purpose of obtaining future work, likely a guest slot as a 'social commentator' on an awful morning TV show, clinging to the lowest rung of Celebrity....get me out of here!"
Do you need us to send help? Who has the gun to your head forcing you to watch it?
I wonder if her smoking through out the pregnancy contributed to or caused this (it was widely publicized and criticised at the time). Can any medical people shed any light?
I am a Speech Pathologist / Audiologist. Without knowing the full medical history, I suspect he had a conductive hearing loss - ofyen associated with chtonic middle ear infections or fluid build up in the middle ear. Typically this is caused because the tubes that drain from the middle ear into the throat are narrower and more horizontal in young children, so fluid doesn't drain from the ear and builds up / is prone to infections. This anatomy is often genetically based (so there is often a familt history of ear health problems). As children grow, the tubes grow in diameter and become more diagonal so fluid drains and hearing problems disappear. The surgery was likely grommets - small tubes inserted into the ear drum to allow fluid to drain out of the ear and allow hearing to be restored while the structures are still growing - and to prevent speech and language difficulties. Smoking during pregnancy would be irrelevant in his hearing problems.
I am also an audiologist, as would the professional who assessed Kit's hearing have been. I agree that the hearing loss sounded like it was likely to have been conductive - that is associated with a very common childhood problem - middle ear pathology, or otitis media. Grommets are a very common, routine surgery performed by an ENT surgeon and are effective at treating conductive hearing loss. I hope that Chrissie's story doesn't give false hope to families whose children are born with genuine permanent hearing losses which aren't treatable by surgery. I also think Chrissie is clearly distressed enough without suggesting that her smoking was responsible. Middle ear pathology is a common childhood illness and affects children from all sorts of families - although there is some research to suggest it is more common where there is passive smoke in e household. ALL children whose language is failing to progress should have there hearing tested and this is possible from about 9 to 12 months of age. Lastly, i'd ben interested to know if Kit was born in Australia because if he was he is highly likely to have had his hearing screened at birth - because that certainly would have picked up a 60 decibel hearing loss, if he had in deed been born with it. We should all be concerned by commonwealth government plans to sell off australian hearing, the commonwealth program who would have given Kit free hearing aids if his hearing loss had been permanent like 2 out of every 1000 australian children.
I actually think its pretty common too, I know my nephew and another little boy who had similar hearings problems and got surgery/grommets to fix it. Also, while I abhor smoking, I think its a bit mean to assume she was smoking 'through out' the pregnancy, I think she admitted she had a few, but I don't think she was chain smoking.
It was her third pregnancy where she was busted, not this one.