Hearing Loss & Deafness Support Group

Is she beyond hearing aids - I've lost 40% in each ear and just got fitted today - I am hearing I think pretty good - can she get any hearing aid? I heard they just came out with a powerful Behind The Ear Model and such - also many late hearing loss adults are choosing CI's because they want to stay with the world they know - and I heard the latest CI's are really amazing. My husband just went to a lecture given by a man who had one on and he was functioning totally with the audience - he also played a tape for everyone that shows how he hears and it sounded a little robotic to my husband - but the guy was taking questions from the audience and he was on the podium.

My doc told me that I would one day end up with a CI - I cried the rest of the day and got really depressed - I couldn't believe he told me that - but I got depressed and cried.

The doctor has told her that she is equally deaf in each ear, but I don't remember how much. She had to go back to another appointment to get hearing aids (they would help), but she refuses to go back, saying the doctor was wrong (whih is stupid because we practically have to yell at her while looking at her for her to hear us).
I don't think my mom can get a CI, since she has blood issues and can only have necessary surgery (the ones that can save her life). I take it you don't believe in CIs. Am I right? Personally, I don't agree with them, but thats a whole different subject.

I am hoping to not need a CI - if I lost the rest of my hearing- I would probably do it in one ear - but the prediction is I may face this in my 60's. I would probably consider it too hard to become a part of the deaf community at that point - so I would work with a CI to stay in the hearing community to function.

I understand with a CI - the simple pleasures of music are lost - or greatly compromised - but who knows - by the time my turn comes - they may have developed the technology to allow people to regain music appreciation, etc.

I understand they just developed a major development with CI's in doubling the frequencies you can perceive and also a software program that allows the user to slowly integrate new sounds onto a really impressive computer chip. So that is how I see the future I guess-

I suppose if I had been a HOH person in my youth, my path would have gone towards a different community and a different learning process in engaging my world -

Becoming deaf later in life poses different difficulties for the person. It reminds me trying to take an older person and tell them, "I am going to move you closer to me." And you mean well, but you live in a colder climate and you have your own friendships and church and way of life and the older person is facing having everything they knew suddenly severed. Many of these older people hang on as long as they possibly can to what they know - before giving up life as they always knew it.

I perceive this struggle in myself and with others who are suddenly confronted with hearing loss.

The hearing aids take at least 3 weeks and generally six weeks for the brain and body to accept them. The first two weeks are horrible.

first of all, you start to receive ambient noises your brain has long forgotten about because it lost the ability to perceive them. The audiologist gives you this ability within 60 seconds of putting in the aids and the brain interprets all of it as noise - you want to pull the aids back out immediately - you can now hear the footsteps of the doctor on the carpet and it is annoying.

Also, traffic, restaurants and such seems overwhelming those first few weeks - your brain hurts and you reach for the aids and pull them out and stick them in your purse -

Your ears get sore and puffy from the aids and you get relief the minute you pull them out.

But if a person can get to week three with those aids - the brain will accept all the noises as normal - you will not perceive the aids in your ears - it will be like the person who is walking around looking for his glasses and they are on his face. I did that once - it was embarrassing. But the body just accepts them as part of the body after several weeks.

The first weeks make and break people on aids - I have a friend with only 30% of his hearing in each ear and he halfway lip reads - he told he couldn't stand wearing the aids - they were too annoying.

He was using aids someone gave him. and the aids were 10 years old.

I tried to reason with him. The newest aids are really different (feedback issues, etc. are more resolved) and he just said that was enough for him.

So I notice older people have a harder time than the young - the middle aged and younger people want their lives back with their friends - and they want to keep going - they also adapt quicker to stuff - like braces, glasses, hearing aids, maybe even a prosthetic leg or something - but it is harder for the older people - usually when they start losing something dear to them - like TV shows - church - things that had a lot of meaning - they give in - it is usually a process.

I returned my first hearing aid - got my money back and tried to wing it - but then people got tired of repeating themselves to me and they got impatient. church and other situations were just getting harder - I couldn't watch TV anymore - I was reading the CIC and looking at pictures -

I still hate hearing aids - I just have to choose everyday - I mean I would try to run my business and mail packages at the store and I was leaning in on people's faces (strangers) trying to make out what they said - it was awkward - plus telling everyone to repeat themselves and stuff and then sensing impatience - it took a few months - but I gave in - I just couldn't function in the world as it stands out there

I couldn't navigate it - but I am assuming the CI will be like an artificial leg or something - it won't be my ear - but it will keep me in the world I know I guess till I die

One guy with a CI said his doctor said "look on the bright side, the way you are set up - you're hearing is only going to get better every year - all your friends' hearing is probably going to get worse."

The guy said, "I never thought of it this way, I lost all I could lose and now I only have things to gain - I can only go up from here."

So that might be the world of the CI people - as technology increases the number of frequencies they can receive and it can increasingly be modulated to more closely resemble human hearing, they will probably eager await their software updates with excitement - they will leave the audiologist office with one more set of sounds to re-experience.

Hi, first i would like to say that it's great that your wanting to learn ASL and are loving the deaf community. I'm hearing myself however my partner is deaf and i love the deaf community as well. It's nice becuase everyone feels as if they are family and they are really close to each other. I would give your mom some time, if your religious you could always pray for her. I hope she learn to accept herself more so that she wont feel left out once she loses it all. Maybe she might one day like to go to deaf events or something. And if you need to talk or anything I'm always available, i love meeting new people and chatting.

I am with RebelsRock, if I couldn't go back to my hearing world, I would definitely hope that people there would embrace me. No one can go through such a dramatic change alone. It must be harder on those of us getting older - because it is like learning to talk all over again -

HELLO MY NAME IS LUCI. I AM HEARING IMPAIRS. RIGHT NOW,I AM WEARING MY HEARING SINCE 5TH GRADE. NOW, I AM WEARING A NEW DIGITAL HEARING AIDS. I JUST LOVE IT AND I GOT USED THE SOUND IT MAKES HUGE DIFFERENT SOUNDS CLEARER FROM THE OLD HEARING AIDS THAT I USED TO WEAR. MAY I ASK YOU SOMETHING? HOW OLD IS YOUR MOTHER? I THINK IT IS HER PRIDE AND ASHAME TO WEAR IT. I JUST KNOW THE FACTS BECAUSE I HAVE BEEN THERE. LET ME KNOW. MAYBE, I MIGHT HELP YOU. LUCI

My mom is 46 and is a VERY proud woman.

THERE YOU GO. SHE STILL YOUNG AND NOT USED TO WEAR HER HEARING AIDS YET ITMIS HER PRIDE, I DON'T BLAME HER. BUT SHE WILL CHANGE EVENTUALLY. IS YOUR MOM HAVE SHORT OR LONG HAIR. PLEASE LET ME KNOW. RIGHT NOW, I HAVE MEDIUM LENGTH HAIR ABOUT TWO INCHES BELOW MY EARS LOPE. EVEN IN THE PAST I HAVE SHORT HAIR ALSO. I'M I HELPING YOU?

Tell your mom I am 43 years old and when I got the news, I could not accept it and would not wear the aids - but now I can hear everything everyone is saying - they programmed the aids to fit the hearing I lost so everything is not amplified - when you have a specific hearing loss, you don't want everything amplified equally - just the frequencies you need - it makes all the difference, I can now watch tv at the same volume as my husband and kids and before I could not- I had to have it too loud and they complained - now I hear everything everyone says - Thank God - tell her we all are rooting for her - I have tinnitus - ringing in the ears and the hearing loss - if she only has hearing loss without the ringing - thank God - she will quickly adjust to that tiny ity bitsy aid in the back of her ear under her hair - no one will know she has a problem or is wearing an aid - it will be like a new life - she will find out all she has been missing - at the movies, at a church concert, the birds singing and she will say - what the heck, there are people wearing prosthetic legs and arms with more inconvenience than this - She lives in the perfect age - tiny aids no one can see - no one will know and if they did know - it might inspire them -