Look at computers, headphones, cellphones, xerox machines, fax machines, TTY’s, even televisions and radios. They all went from large to small and improved. Televisions stayed large and went to very thin as well.   Now, lets look at the hearing aid. Hearing aids started out as horns, something looking like the Shofa used on the Jewish holidays.

The first real hearing aid by Sonotone with a transistor was put on the market in 1952 for $229. In fact, AT&T (American Telephone and Telegraph……remember them?) gave out free transistor licenses in honor of Alexander Graham Bell. Without losing a beat, companies began producing their own aids and competing.

Acousticon put an aid out soon after for $74.50. The hearing aids were powered by batteries and worn around the waist. Could u imagine if the competition continued with prices like the ones mentioned to this day? Anyway, my point is that hearing aids have always been small, but they never quite improved and never got cheaper the way other technology has. In fact, the hearing aid price is so varied and so steep and so difficult to shop around for, that most buyers will not price them the way we do when buying a car. Not one single audiologist I’ve met or discussed with friends, have a hearing aid pricelist on their wall.

 Sure, we have the directional microphones and the programming of the aids for different environments and background noise reductions. We have the options of digital, digital programming and analog. All promising maximum speech understanding. Did u ever wonder whether it was all a gimmick? I mean, after all, hearing aids don’t provide 20/20 hearing, so why make promises u can’t keep?

All I know is that when I cut the background noise out on my hearing aid, with that advantage comes the downside, the voice i’m listening to is now lower as well. Or when there are two speakers, one behind me and one in front of me, my directional mics seem to get a little ditsy and neurotic. Point being that for some reason, the hearing aid industry has changed asthetically but not really technically. They have their new state of the art micro style differences, the ergonomic designs made especially for the boomer generation who has become so vain and forgotten their roots. And I just love when a company states, u won’t even know you’re wearing them……duh! never in a million years. I am constantly reminded that I’m wearing my aid. Whether from someone’s dumb question of “are u wearing your aid today” to “is your aid working,” or whether I am experiencing feedback that day or my ears are itching from the molds.

Naturally, I’ve accepted that hearing aids are not the perfect solution but they give me the best situation for my hearing loss. I would have preferred the aids have been more miraculously improved without convincing us they are so dynamically tuned for our specific hearing loss and that our ability to hear will be a miracle. And whats with the tiny battery? How do they expect the largest population of hearing impaired people to put that little battery into that little thingie compartment? Oh yes, they came up with a solution to that, a tape attached to the battery. And don’t forget about what happens when dropping that little battery on the floor. It’s amazing to watch a group of seniors on hands and knees looking for that stinker. It’s also amazing to see how far that little battery can travel when its not even on.

 I never lead anyone to believe that hearing aids are the all or nothing solution. Its just a temporary solution to a problem that can’t seem to be fixed by medical science thru other means, yet.

During this past summer, after a great deal of research, I purchased a $3,200 hearing aid.  You read that sticker price correctly and that was for one aid.  I tried it out for the 2 full 45 days, that was a total of 90 days due to when the rep came in to see me, she gave me a different model of the aid I was trying out that I liked better.  So they gave me the aid until the one I was purchasing came through and that day was the day my next 45 days started.  I landed up giving it back on day 105 (total days that I spent with this hearing aid which included the time I was loaned the model) and taking a $320 loss.  But hey, in all honesty, the audiologist should get paid for all the time she spent with me and trust me, she spent at least one day a week with me. I made the decision to go back to my cheap old hearing aid.

I did learn something that I did not want to face and that was, I am truly convinced that many (not all) but many audiologists cannot be  brought up to date properly due to the constant and rapid technology changes.  I am also convinced that the hearing audiologist DOES NOT UNDERSTAND HEARING LOSS as in, please don’t speak to me when the aid is out of my ear because I cannot hear you and I am not a great lip reader. 

 In the meantime, all I want is a hearing aid that works better and works to my benefit. I couldn’t care less about all these ergodynamic state of the art designs. After all, I don’t expect anyone to say, ay Pearl, cool hearing aid you got there in your ear!

A pretty good example of this would be my bi-weekly swim class.  I swim unaided.  There are about fifty women in my class.  You can imagine how the locker room sounds afterwards; women chatting, water and hair dryers running, locker doors squeaking open and slamming shut, toilets flushing.   I hear none of that.   I shower, wipe off, get dressed and dry my hair all in relative peace enjoying alternate sensations of the locker room experience—a warm shower, combined smells of body lotion and chlorine, hot air on my scalp.

Finally dried and dressed, I put in my hearing aids.  ACCKK!  NOISE!  PAIN!  Shower water blasts against tile.  A bathing suit drying machine spins into hammering thumps.  Fifty hair dryers sound like jet engines revving to take off.   Metal lockers clang open and shut continuously, as women shout to each other over the din.   I head for the quiet peace of my car as quickly as possible.

It has been six months since I got the Phonak Naidas.  I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to the noise.  While I am extremely grateful for the new clarity in speech understanding, I have to admit many other environmental sounds are unpleasant.   A normal ear miraculously filters out all that unwanted noise.  People with normal hearing might be vaguely aware, but locker room noise is not painful to them.   There are no words to describe what I hear.  The technology that allows me to hear t’s and s’s, called frequency transposition, is relatively new to the human experience.  It is anything but natural.  Nothing can replace natural hearing.

I am mostly happy with my hearing aids, but I’m just as happy to take them off when communicating with other people isn’t crucial.  I have the option to turn on my aids and socialize, or to enjoy the quiet.  All too often I choose quiet.

So what’s this got to do with hearing loss?  Nothing.  Except that those of us who lose our hearing are often told, “There are worse things,” when we open up about our feelings.  And it’s true.  There ARE worse things.  We all know it.  I could name at least ten people who have suffered more than me.  Truth be told, if I were to rate my life, good fortune would far outweigh the hearing loss.  I have even been able to put a happy spin on going deaf from time to time.

For example, people often remind me how lucky I am to be able to sleep soundly.  Only it’s not quite true.  I hear footsteps in the night because of my good low tones.  Since low tones are only thing I hear well, the sound of people walking across wood floors in the night seems over amplified.  There are many sounds I have wished I could hear at night—a soft rain, fire alarm, a mosquito buzzing around my face.   It’s a fact that I sleep right through my neighbor’s barking dog though.  For that I’m grateful.

And yes—I can see the humor in hearing loss.  Almost all my hard of hearing and deaf friends have replied back to burps and farts, thinking someone actually SAID something meaningful to them.  Most of us have funny stories about misunderstandings caused by hearing loss.  Looking back I can laugh about the time I high-fived a friend when she said she was getting a divorce.  I thought she said she was getting a new horse.  Hearing loss can be uproariously funny.

But it’s also serious.   I realize my hearing loss isn’t on the same scale as losing a child, and there are advantages to being able to sleep through a barking dog.   It’s still a loss.

I can’t imagine reminding a friend to count her blessings after she lost her job.  Would I tell her she’s lucky she can talk on a phone because it’s really hard to get a job when you can’t?  Would I tell a friend she’s lucky she doesn’t have to spend money at a beauty salon after she lost her hair from chemo treatment?  Would I joke to a blind person that I’m going blind too, then repeat a funny story about not being able to read a menu in a restaurant and how I needed reading glasses?  What?!  You don’t think that’s funny?!  Well that’s part of your problem.  You just need to see the humor in going blind, you see. . .

Most of us with hearing loss live in quiet pain and isolation for years while our hearing dwindles away to nothing.  If we are lucky, eventually we find a group of people who have experienced hearing loss.  People who understand.  They don’t remind you to count your blessings because they know you already do.  They don’t tell you how lucky you are that you can’t hear things at night.  Most have a heart-wrenching or scary story about not hearing things in the night.  They don’t make jokes about going deaf.

They know it’s not funny most the time.

One of the key findings is that the country’s hearing loss population grew to 34.25 million in 2008. That represents 11 percent of the population or 29.5 percent of all households. Since 2004, the hearing loss population grew by 8.8 percent as the average age of Americans rose.

Yet despite the rising numbers of people with hearing loss, the survey shows that the use of hearing aids remains relatively low. Roughly one in four Americans with hearing loss uses hearing aids.

Why is that figure so low? The survey suggests a few reasons. One is that the use of hearing aids is closely linked to the degree of hearing loss. Fewer than one in 10 people with mild hearing loss uses hearing aids. The figure rises to four in 10 people with moderate-to-severe hearing loss. Hearing aid owners are more likely to have a bilateral loss, to have a severe-to-profound loss, to have more difficulty hearing normal speech across a room without visual cues and to have difficulty hearing in noise.

Still, the survey suggests most people wait years before they do anything about their hearing loss. Hearing aids are still closely associated with senior citizens. While there is truth to that perception, hearing loss is clearly widespread. Unfortunately, it takes a long time for people to recognize that they can benefit from doing something about their own loss. That fact does not appear to be changing.

For more details on the survey, see “MarkeTrak VIII: 25-year trends in the hearing health market,” Hearing Review.

The SayWhatClub is a strong support group for late deafened and adults with hearing loss.  We believe strongly in helping one another through our support groups and through Education.  The University of Washington needs everyones help, especially parents who have children with hearing loss or deafness.   You can learn more about the study here https://depts.washington.edu/projhql/  The University also has a facebook page about the study.  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Quality-of-Life-of-Children-and-Youth-who-are-Deaf-or-Hard-of-Hearing/121377458983

Initially, when I found out we were to be seated at an elevated table (it ran the entire length from the podium to the far wall, seating the Commanding Officer, both 1st Sgts., the Guest of Honor, and their guests), to the immediate left of the podium, I was not elated, but after thinking on it I decided that my seat location was more of a savings grace than the curse it proved to be, as having the seat closest to the podium, on the end, I wasn’t in a position for anyone else at the table to talk to me, other than my husband, seated next to me.  Not that I am anti-social, I love talking to people, but in such a noisy environment I often find myself thankful that I am not in a position to be spoken to from across a distance.  I really hate having to be thankful for that.  Sigh…

Also, I thought being the closest to the speaker would mean I had the best seat for lip/speech reading, but in reality it wasn’t so, as I had a hard time reading lips in profile, which caused me to zoom my attention in on whomever was speaking, with an intensity beyond what is normal. And, as we who cannot hear know, normal, for us, is already pretty intense.

Add to all of that the fact my husband, a participant in the ceremony, was not seated next to me until just before the meal was served. And, as an additional consideration, because of my seat placement there was no one between me and the speaker to take cues from.

Drum roll please…  the good news, I rose and sat at the appropriate times during the prayer and the National Anthem. However, as the Guest of Honor spoke, an eighty-four year old Marine recounting his experiences in WWII, I was watching so diligently that I failed to notice the entire banquet hall rising to their feet in applause, as the speaker paused.

Relaxing a bit while clapping, I looked away from the podium for the first time, realizing I was the only person seated. Not so noticeable when you are part of the crowd, but very noticeable when you are sitting at the front of a banquet hall, at an elevated table, within three feet of the podium, from which a speaker is commanding the attention of the entire hall of 250 people.

I’m sure many wondered why I did not join them in standing ovation, a few possibly thought I was simply being rude (the only person I knew was my husband, and save the few I was introduced to, most didn’t know I couldn’t hear), but I remained seated, as rising at this point would have brought even more attention to the fact that I was the only one who was not standing. If I’ve learned anything at all from years of attending my children’s piano recitals, if you hit a wrong note don’t bring attention to it by making a big deal of it. Just play on as if it was the right note all along. I remained seated.

I later apologized to the Guest of Honor and his two daughters, and they were very gracious and understanding, as the Guest of Honor himself struggles with hearing loss.

Just a few short years ago I would have been mortified in a similar situation, but thankfully I’ve learned to cut myself some slack, though I still would sometimes like to announce to the crowd, at the beginning of a banquet, sporting event, conference, etc., “Hello, my name is Michele and I cannot hear. If at any point during our time together, I appear confused, fail to rise or be seated at the appropriate time, speak out when I should be silent, remain silent when I should respond, or display any other behavior that might seem out of the ordinary, please do not think of me as rude, ignorant, unpatriotic, disrespectful, irreverent, or any of the other wrong assumptions I’ve encountered from people over the years. I cannot hear, which often causes me to react inappropriately. Thank you.”

And to all of those family members and friends who step in to cue and clue us in when something is happening that we have missed because we can’t hear, THANK YOU!!!!  We often don’t realize how much we need an assistant until we are without one.

I once tried an aid on my left ear, many moons ago, with no affects.  I wear my aid on my “good” ear from the minute I wake up in the morning until I go to bed.  The only time I usually remove it during the day, is when I get jock itch in my ear.  Since last Thursday, I’ve developed extreme pain in my ear and on the crest of the helix.  You know, that part of the ear that has nada to do with hearing.  It’s where u would stick the earmold under that little sucker.

Today is the first day I could not wear my hearing aid due to extreme pain and let me tell you, it was a real eye opener for me and the people around me.  I have never gone this many waking hours out of the house without my aid.  First off, I found the people I work with not able to deal with me.  WOW! Now for the surprise, these are my teammates and we work with the hearing impaired and deaf population and their families.

I guess it’s true when we say, you don’t know what it feels like till you’ve been in my shoes.  Hearing people really do not understand deafness, let alone a hearing loss. Maybe it’s their fear of the unthinkable.  It immobilizes people when we discuss our unability to hear.  The very idea of not being able to hear a discussion, a disagreement or the hearing persons fear to communicate with us because WE cannot hear them.  So afraid to initiate a strategy to communicate with us for fear of catching what we have. 

Then, I encountered the people in the stores, on the streets and the dangers of walking in between cars to cross streets. Naturally, I can’t use my phone, which means, I can’t communicate and others can’t communicate with me, which means I’m going to be one pissed woman by the end of this week.  I’m very social and love to communicate.   The I’m in your face type of person I guess.

Lastly, there’s my family.  Everyones has their mouths wide open to over emphasize what they want to say to me.  It’s so weird and it’s also pretty scary to actually not hear the voices of the people I love.  I guess I’ve taken the assistance I get from my aid for granted.  And friends, co-workers and family around me, have taken my hearing loss and wearing an aid for granted.  I guess now they realize I am not hearing anything and that I am truly hearing impaired though one cannot officially call me deaf.

Don’t you just love when a hearing person says, wow, you have such great speech for a person with hearing loss?  It blows my mind.

Oh by the way, my Doctor really impressed me today. The man actually took out paper and wrote the questions he had for me and had me answer them (verbally of course).  He did not want me to put my hearing aid on because of the pain.  Oh and by the way, this was my Internist not my ENT. 

Here’s one of the reasons I dislike ENT Doctors.  Many years ago, during a phase where I refused to be aided, I went to an ENT Doctor because I was having terrible sinus problems.  As soon as I tell him I have a hearing loss he calls in his audiologist to do a hearing test.   I showed him my audiogram which was taken several months ago by my audiologist. But no, he wants one from his office.  I refused.

This ENT Doctor proceeds to look in my ears after I tell him about my hearing loss, show him my audiogram and explain that I have no speech discrim in my left ear.  The man looks into my ears, looks very seriously at me and says, I don’t see why u can’t hear out of that left ear, it looks perfectly fine.  With that remark said, I stood up, said thank you for your time and left (as fast as I could).  I decided from that moment on, that people, even many well meaning and not so well meaning professionals in the field, do not understand us.  It’s as if they have deafaphobia, the unimaginable! the unthinkable! 

So what is my point?  I raise my glass to all of us for holding our heads up high, for not allowing this to drag us to the grave and for continuing to educate those who hear.

Pick up any in-flight magazine, thumb through the pages, and you will find endless “Best” lists.  These lists mostly, but not always, are dedicated to highlighting the best restaurants–Seafood, Italian, American Steakhouses, and more specifically–the best Sushi and USDA Prime Steakhouses–in a given city.  However, you can also find the “Top Ten Factory Tours” and “The Best Doctors in New York”!!  Cool!!

The latter is good to know in case I find myself in New York in need of plastic surgery, hand surgery, a cardiologist, hair transplantation, spine surgery, a sports medicine specialist, a cosmetic dermatologist, or a cosmetic dentist; in that respective order.

I do find it a tad superficial that plastic surgery is at the top of the list of “The Best Doctors in New York”, not to say a plastic surgeon’s work is not vital, but beyond those disfigured by birth defects, as the result of car accidents, and in fires, etc., the rest, in my opinion–your boob and nose jobs, face lifts, tummy tucks, and lip or other enhancements–are performed in an attempt to reverse or halt the effects of gravity and aging, and in the sake of vanity.  All of which any consenting adult is more than welcome to elect. No judgment here.

If being first on “The Best Doctors in New York” list was not enough, I can even find a list of “The Best Plastic Surgeons in America”!!! This information will come in handy if, during my travels, I have the need for plastic surgery while in Los Angeles, Atlanta, Salt Lake City, Miami, Denver, or Charlotte, North Carolina. Hmmmm, the top plastic surgeon from New York (that made the previous list) is not among them??? How good can he be???

Yes, I’m being a smartass!!  Why??  Because, I consider finding the best audiologist and/or cochlear implant surgeon much more important than who can perform my next face lift, boob job, tummy tuck, hair transplant, facial peel, or teeth whitening!! (I heard that collective gasp from all of those readers with blinding, white smiles, perky C-cups, and faces stretched so tight you could bounce a dime off of them.)

Well, just give it a few years and we may see “The Best Audiologists” or “The Top Ten Cochlear Implant Surgeons” as we thumb through our in-flight magazines. Our numbers, those of us who are Deaf/deaf/Hard of Hearing, are ever increasing. A fact that holds no consolation, and I find no pleasure in.