Anyway, I'm not sure what her doctor said to convince her this time, but she's decided to let him try to fix the damage. It won't restore any hearing but it should stop the whole water problem if it works. He cited her a success rate of something like 97%, which I think she's still a bit concerned over. I still remember how she just about freaked when I told her I had my eyes lasered while I was in Chicago. Even though the odds of something going wrong were incredibly small, the risk of something like blindness was just too horrible for her to contemplate.
I'm pretty sure there's no actual risk in today's procedure beyond the risk you normally take whenever you go under general anesthesia. Either they can craft a new eardrum out of one of the ear bones or they can't. Still, it's something to keep my fingers crossed over.