On December 20 2017 our beautiful boy Nicholas Isaiah Altamirano was born without an ear and some skin tags on his face, there are more things that can be mentioned but we prefer to stick to the status quo. We have been seeing doctors for his conditions ever since. Thankfully we were unintentionally prepared for this situation. We have been taking ASL classes at College of the Desert since before we were pregnant with our son. Further, knowing more about deaf culture really helped us on making the decision not to go with the cochlear implant surgery. Instead, we decided to let him hear in an non-invasive way so he can develope his speech. If he chooses to talk in the future, at least he can have that tool under his belt. When he’s old enough to decide he wants surgery, we will move mountains to provide this for him; his choice is all that matters. On March 27 2018 our family traveled to Rady children’s hospital in San Diego California at 3pm, so that our child could get fitted for his cochlear head band. We took this video of our son hearing for the first time during the visit at Radys. He was so full of emotions, he couldn’t handle the joy of hearing his mother and family; he almost cried after all of his beautiful smiles to the new sounds, especially his own. He was mostlikely born with a condition called Goldenhar syndrome, he hasn’t been properly diagnosed by a geneticist yet due to waiting times from his insurances, but other doctors have said this is probably and most likely what he has. Please watch this video to educate others on deaf culture.