Pronouncing Ronan

Ronan fell asleep on the way to his sleep appointment this morning. I had to cancel his usual teacher session because Inara was sick and they have a rule that if anyone in the house is sick you have to cancel in order to hinder germs spreading from house to house. Even though he missed all the exhaustive play time he still dozed for a morning nap on the way to the sleep center. He looked cute with his glasses drooped half way off his nose.We sat in the waiting room and Ronan gave a tug and his gear dropped to around his neck. I tried to quickly adjust his equipment back into place when I heard "Rhonda!" I continued to adjust his glasses as he attempted to swat my hands away in protest. "Rhonda!" By the third Rhonda I glanced up to see a nurse looking down at us. "Is this Rhonda?" I looked to chairs over to see if maybe she was talking about the elderly woman who was starring intently at the price is right, which was playing on the waiting room tv. The woman didn't budge her stare so I turned back to the nurse.

"You mean Ronan?" I asked puzzled. "Oh is that how you say it?" "No, you had it right the first time there is an invisible D in his name and the last N is completely silent. And yes I gave my son a girl's name." No I did not tell her that that was just the sarcasm brewing in my mind. Instead I simply acknowledged that it was pronounced Row-nan.

This got me thinking about people who have only seen Ronan's name spelled how they think it is pronounced. Most of the time people think the Ron is like in Ronald but it is really a Row sound. This is why we sometimes call him Ro bro. Most people do get his name correctly but the occasional mispronunciation doesn't bother me. The only time I've been truly bothered by it was with a new Endocrinology nurse. She decided that he would be called RJ since his full name is Ronan Jesse. She called us back that way and even after I insisted she call him Ronan she referred to him as RJ.

Back to the present day sleep study. The doctor wants him to have an oxygen sleep study this Sunday night. All the festivities of Easter should be over. My in-laws are taking the big kids and my mom will have Monday off to watch Inara. The timing is good. But the goal of the sleep study will be to see if the oxygen makes his breathing worse or better. I know that may sound weird and it's rather lengthy to explain. If it shows the oxygen improves his sleep then he will be prescribed oxygen which he must wear every night. If it makes his sleeping worse then they will have to decide how to proceed.

A trach has been brought up but Isaac shot that down immediately. I agree with Isaac as well and I have no peace about it whatsoever. I don't feel it is the route that is right for Ronan. Also the only reason they are talking about the trach is because his tonsils are so large they are blocking his airway. But they are too skittish to take the tonsils so instead they logically conclude to put in an invasive trach in Ronan. We have decided we would rather risk complications with the tonsils being removed than greatly reduce Ronan's quality of life and increase his risk of infection.

Sometimes choices aren't easy especially when you're trying to make potentially life altering decisions for your child. Sometimes as parents you make good ones and right ones but sometimes you are wrong and make bad choices. But I think all you can do is what you think is best with the information you have.