Have you ever listened in the dark? or should I say, Have you ever listened to the silence in the dark?
I feel the urge to write about my hearing. Or should I say, lack of hearing. Most people think because I wear a hearing aid on my right ear, that I hear well with my left ear. Then others think, because I wear a hearing aid, I must have 20/20 hearing.
Pull up a chair and learn something…..a hearing loss is very different from a vision loss. Even with a vision loss, you can wear glasses and not have 20/20 vision. For some reason, vision loss and wearing glasses is 150% more accepted than a hearing loss and wearing hearing aids. With a hearing loss, one does not hear all that is spoken or hear all the environmental sounds because they wear a hearing aid. The thing to remember is that a hearing loss means I cannot hear certain sounds with or without a hearing aid. So no matter how loud you scream what you want me to hear or move your mouth in total exaggeration thinking I am going to lipread you in slow clowny motions, it ain’t gonna happen.
So please, if I do not hear you, don’t ask me if my hearing aid is on? don’t ask me if I’m wearing my hearing aid today? Fortunately for you, if I am not wearing my aid, I will tell you and please don’t ask me why I’m not hearing what you’re saying? I find all these remarks/questions terribly offensive and it makes me realize how much you, as a hearing person, do not understand about the science of hearing loss.
I have no problem educating you about hearing loss. So the next time I don’t hear you, ask me what you can do to help me hear what you’re saying. More than likely, you will need to REPHRASE what you’re saying. Don’t bother repeating the same exact sentence when I’ve just finished saying what three times and you keep repeating the sentence over and over. I’m not going to get it until I know what the subject is that we are discussing.
Imagine, I want you to try very hard and imagine looking at a persons face during a conversation when suddenly, all you can hear are the vowels in the sentences or the consonants only. Or you’re sitting in a movie theatre and hearing the voices from the screen but not being able to discriminate what is being said. Welcome to life as a hard of hearing person.
No matter how many times I explain hearing loss, there are always those who believe that hearing aids are for old people. Or hearing aids should be disguised or that the hard of hearing person hears what they want to hear. The thing I hate most is the look on a persons face when I can’t catch whats being said and they need to rephrase. There’s this look of “man, how much longer is this going to take?” or “man, how do I make you understand what I’m saying.” well, hey, I can understand what you’re saying if I could hear what you were saying.
I wear my hearing aid all day and let me tell you, listening, takes a great deal of energy out of me. I am in automatic pilot when my hearing aid is on. I just love when people say to me, Pearl, you speak so well! Of course I speak well, I wasn’t born deaf and my hearing impairment did not start until my teenage years.
I work hard to hear people. I love to socialize and having a hearing problem can really alienate you from people, if you allow it to. And there are times, I do NOT want to hear things. Thats right! I don’t want to hear the noise, the conversation I can’t understand or even the flushing of the toilets. At the end of the day, when I pull off my hearing aid and all goes quiet in my surroundings, I feel the exhaustion leave my body, my antennas close and I feel good lying down in bed and listening to the silence. And all is quiet and sleep prepares to set in.
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