I\u2019m deaf.\u00a0 Now what? \u00a0 \u00a0By Simon Schofield<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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5 out of 5 stars<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
★<\/i>★<\/i>★<\/i>★<\/i>★<\/i> 5\/5<\/span><\/div>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t $\"\"$ \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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\u201cI finally faced up to my problem one summer evening, strolling up the road on the\u00a0way for a drink with my teenage daughter. She was on my right hand side \u2013 and\u00a0<\/span>chatting away.\u00a0<\/span>I could hardly hear a word she was saying. \u00a0<\/span>In hindsight, all the signs were there \u2013 and familiar to those of us who now wear\u00a0<\/span>hearing aids. I asked people to repeat things. A lot. I had the TV or radio on louder\u00a0<\/span>than everyone else. At parties, or in the pub, I struggled to hear the person talking\u00a0<\/span>to me over the hubbub. I\u2019d even returned a pair of headphones, claiming they were\u00a0<\/span>faulty because the sound on the right had side was muffled and close to inaudible.\u00a0<\/span>I\u2019d ignored all the signs, but I couldn\u2019t carry on doing that.\u00a0<\/span>Was I deaf on that side? It was time to find out. It was a big decision \u2013 and one I\u00a0<\/span>wasn\u2019t too fond of pursuing to its conclusion. I was only fifty two, running my own\u00a0<\/span>company in television production and in my free time leading an extremely active\u00a0<\/span>life indulging my passion (my wife would say obsession) for road cycling. Whilst it\u2019s\u00a0<\/span>never a great idea to be complacent, life was pretty sweet \u2013 on the grand scale of\u00a0<\/span>things, I didn\u2019t have a lot to worry about. So I really didn\u2019t want to be deaf. \u00a0<\/span>But having made the decision, there was little point in delay. I made a private\u00a0<\/span>appointment with an ENT specialist for a hearing test and examination. It didn\u2019t\u00a0<\/span>take long. I had quite severe loss on the right hand side and a mild loss on the left.\u00a0<\/span>It was \u201cidiopathic\u201d \u2013 this is doctor-speak for \u201cWe have no idea why you\u2019re deaf.\u201d\u00a0<\/span>There was one highly unlikely thing that needed to be ruled out, which is a\u00a0<\/span>common cause of single-sided deafness, namely an acoustic neuroma. You don\u2019t\u00a0<\/span>want one of those, but an MRI scan, arranged through the NHS, provided\u00a0<\/span>reassurance.<\/span><\/p>
I wasn\u2019t dying, I was just deaf.\u00a0<\/span>Now what? The immediate priority was a cycling trip to the Alps to climb a few hills,\u00a0<\/span>watch a race \u2013 and reflect that I was now officially deaf. Over a few beers with my\u00a0<\/span>mates, the way forward emerged: The problem wasn\u2019t going to fix itself \u2013 I was\u00a0<\/span>going to need hearing aids. I wasn\u2019t thrilled, but I just needed to get on with it.\u00a0<\/span>I hit Google when I got home \u2013 and emerged a couple of days later, thoroughly\u00a0<\/span>confused. I work in a highly technical industry, I\u2019m a fully paid up gadget-freak and\u00a0<\/span>I\u2019m pretty clued up on electronics and technology but the choice was\u00a0<\/span>overwhelming. I needed a human being to help me \u2013 and one who knew what they\u00a0<\/span>were talking about. I found Rob on the web, and a few days later, he was sitting\u00a0<\/span>across from me at the dining room table.\u00a0<\/span>I feel a bit sorry for audiologists in this position \u2013 they tend to be the focus of your\u00a0<\/span>frustration that one of your essential faculties has gone south, never to return and\u00a0<\/span>dealing with people who are essentially in a state of shock can\u2019t be easy.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>
Rob was very patient \u2013 and explained that my dream scenario, a hearing aid that\u00a0<\/span>would be invisible, have eternal battery life and would restore my hearing to 20\/20,\u00a0<\/span>was probably not going to happen.\u00a0<\/span>He took me through the options and guided me towards a Behind-The-Ear (BTE)\u00a0<\/span>CROS system.\u00a0 The system would place a tiny box of tricks, nestling just behind the\u00a0<\/span>ear, on my bad side. In it \u2013 a microphone which would gather sound and send it,\u00a0<\/span>via Bluetooth, to a second box of tricks on my good side. All the sound would be\u00a0<\/span>channeled\u00a0into my good ear \u2013 with some impressive electronics mixing it and\u00a0<\/span>processing it to make it sound as natural as possible and to fool the brain that the\u00a0<\/span>bad ear was working.\u00a0<\/span>There was an inevitable period of adjustment. No matter how good the electronics,\u00a0<\/span>the new sound is different. I now know that it\u2019s called \u201cprocessed\u201d sound. It\u00a0<\/span>sounded artificial and a bit weird. But gradually, I became accustomed to it.<\/span><\/p>
Not\u00a0<\/span>overflowing with happiness, but adapted \u2013 and three years later, the adaptation\u00a0<\/span>process continues. \u00a0<\/span>I think Rob probably finds me one of his more demanding clients. I had him back\u00a0<\/span>several times to tweak the sound and the volume in the early months \u2013 and his\u00a0<\/span>patience and knowledge was always exemplary. He refrained from giving me the\u00a0<\/span>hard sell on new products or advances in software and hardware, but, continuing to\u00a0<\/span>do my own research, I am now on my third CROS system.\u00a0<\/span>The principle remains the same, but the technological advances are substantial. My\u00a0<\/span>latest Phonak system is much better than anything I\u2019ve had before \u2013 the sound is\u00a0<\/span>very natural and the ability of the software to learn from the various sound\u00a0<\/span>environments I encounter is incredibly clever.\u00a0<\/span>Of course, it\u2019s not been cheap. Rob does price keenly and he has given me good\u00a0<\/span>deals. But I have spent thousands of pounds trying to defeat my disability. Three\u00a0<\/span>years on, my life has changed. Some of it was going to happen anyway, and some\u00a0<\/span>of it was a consequence of being deaf. I am reluctant to do some things that I used\u00a0<\/span>to do. But my main interests remain the same, I still greatly enjoy life, I still ride my\u00a0<\/span>bike up mountains, and nowadays I just try to see deafness as part of life\u2019s rich\u00a0<\/span>tapestry. It could be a lot worse . . . . . and every few weeks I get to have a good\u00a0<\/span>moan at Rob.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>
In conclusion \u2013 if you find yourself in my position, I\u2019d give the following advice:\u00a0<\/span>Don\u2019t think that a hearing aid will restore your hearing to perfection. It might, but\u00a0<\/span>it\u2019s unlikely. You have to learn to deal with being a bit deaf and you will work out\u00a0<\/span>strategies that help.\u00a0<\/span>As in many areas of life, you get what you pay for. The more expensive hearing\u00a0<\/span>aids do produce better results.\u00a0<\/span>Tell people that you\u2019re a bit deaf. It removes embarrassment and everybody I\u2019ve\u00a0<\/span>ever told has reacted positively.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>
And be nice to Rob \u2013 it\u2019s not his fault you\u2019re deaf!\u201d<\/span><\/p>
S Schofield<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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I\u2019m deaf.\u00a0 Now what? \u00a0 \u00a0By Simon Schofield 5 out of 5 stars ★★★★★ 5\/5 \u201cI finally faced up to my problem one summer evening, strolling up the road on the\u00a0way for a drink with my teenage daughter. She was on my right hand side \u2013 and\u00a0chatting away.\u00a0I could hardly hear a word she was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_oct_exclude_from_cache":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-287","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","col-md-12"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287"}],"version-history":[{"count":34,"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4912,"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/287\/revisions\/4912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.trusthear.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}