Community Corner

LI Family Raising Funds To Buy New Hearing Aids For Honduran Boy

4-year-old daughter told mother she could hear "God whispering" in the wind with hearing aids. She's raising funds for a new set for Nathan.

Port Washington resident Ruby Ganci is using her own struggle with hearing loss to raise funds to help Nathan Gómez Valle.
Port Washington resident Ruby Ganci is using her own struggle with hearing loss to raise funds to help Nathan Gómez Valle. (Lindsay Ganci, Iris Gómez Valle)

PORT WASHINGTON, NY — Ruby Ganci had the same challenges that other children her age have as they are growing through life. But she would also become overwhelmed in crowds and the movement of a car driving by would cause her to become anxious. She struggled in her dance class.

It was not until the mask protocol was enforced in the COVID-19 pandemic that her mother, Lindsay, and father, Alec, realized that she might have a problem hearing properly. Ganci said the four-year-old told her, “‘Mommy, move your mouth, I can’t hear what you said.’”

Soon after that an audiologist confirmed that Ruby had hearing loss and fitted her with a set of bi-lateral hearing aids. There was an immediate change in Ruby once she could hear properly.

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“She told us she heard God whispering to her in the wind because she had never heard the wind before,” said Ganci who has lived in Port Washington for 11 years.

By restoring her sense of hearing, the hearing aids have restored in Ruby, who will be five next month, a sense of calm, and it has helped her language development.

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“The whole thing has been a learning experience for us,” Ganci said.

One of the more interesting pieces of knowledge that Lindsay learned was that hearing aids are not considered essential medical devices to most insurance carriers in New York, even for young children like Ruby who might need them as part of their development. Some devices can run well over $3,000, and they are not covered, so they are purchased mostly with out-of-pocket funds.

There was no other option for the Gancis, and they were fortunate enough to be able to pay for Ruby’s new hearing aids.

“It didn’t mean that my child would go without something she needs,” she said.

On that journey she realized there might be other families who are not be able to afford the hearing aids and their children are suffering for it.

“I know that I would have been praying that someone would say that they would help us,” she said, explaining that hearing aids help improve a child’s development by opening them up to a world they have been missing out on fully enjoying. “Kids need this support so much, and it changed Ruby’s life.”

Ganci could not imagine another child going without the hearing aids and unable to use all five of their senses, so she immediately began raising funds to help out other families in need. This past week, she connected in a Facebook group with Iris Gómez Valle, a single mother and medical student in Honduras who was seeking a hand-me-down pair of used hearing aids for her son, Nathan, whose first pair, which are also second-hand, do not work anymore.

In an email, Valle said that getting hearing aids and attention for children with hearing loss is hard. She became concerned when her son, who is almost seven, was not speaking and appeared withdrawn when he was about three-years-old, she said. She was initially told by several pediatricians that he was just a late bloomer, but her mother’s instinct knew something was not right, so she took him to an ear, nose, and throat doctor, who diagnosed his hearing loss.

Eventually, she was able to purchase hearing aids for him for about $2,000, and he started taking speech therapy twice a week. “He finally started talking last year, and his improvement has been amazing and it has been so beautiful” seeing him become more of a “normal kid,” she said.

He used to be shy, and usually embarrassed to interact with other kids, and he would get frustrated and cry when he couldn't be understood, but that changed with his learning to speak, and he is making friends, she said.

“The other day he told me when he was small he couldn't tell me what he felt, and it was scary for him,” she said.

Ruby and Nathan got to meet the other night over a Facebook video call, and they were each so happy to have a friend who wears hearing aids, Ganci said. Nathan had never met another child like himself, she said.

When Ganci asked Ruby how she wanted to raise money for Nathan, she told her, “Let’s have a bake sale because she loves to bake with mommy,” Ganci said.

So far, the inaugural run of Hear With Ruby has raised $800.

On Friday, the family will be hosting a COVID-19 safe drive-by Hear With Ruby bake sale at 35 5th Ave. in Port Washington. They hope it will raise enough money to buy Nathan a new pair of hearing aids.

Local businesses like Smusht, SweetStuffPW, and Kim London Designs have donated cupcakes and other baked goods. The pair is only asking for donations, which are at the discretion of the purchaser.

“We want to level the playing field for little Nathan,” Lindsay said.

Valle said that parents want to give their child the best opportunity to thrive and all the tools they need, and kids with hearing aids need that extra effort. “Their development, their future depends on it,” she said.

It helps for Valle to know she has some common ground with another mother going through the same thing.

“Lindsay has experienced this herself and as a mom she is helping us get hearing aids for Nathan,” she said. “We are blessed to have met a woman with such a kind heart and willing to give a helping hand. I do hope someday I can return this act of kindness to more kids in need, touching more lives.”

Funds can be sent via Venmo to Hear With Ruby @Lindsay-Ganci under the memo “Hear With Ruby.”


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