Someone posed a question about how many studies had been done on the effectiveness of cochlear implants. I thought back to a time when I was diagnosed as being deaf - hard of hearing, actually, by today's standards, and thought about being deaf TODAY.
Back then the options were few. One either wore hearing aids or didn't. My first hearing aid was a body hearing aid - worn with a harness, a battery, a cord with a button and an ear mold made of glass. The cord attached to the hearing aid, and the ear mold was fitted to the ear.
Picture today's cochlear implant sound processor - the cabling and the headpiece. The headpiece with the magnet is about the size of the button attached to the body hearing aid cord of long ago.
You either were taught to speak, lipread, fitted with a hearing aid, accompanied with auditory training. The other option was to learn sign language. You went to a state school for the Deaf or a private school for the Deaf, that is, if you had the money to pay for it.
I first wore a body aid with a harness, later clipped the body aid inside the center of my bra. Later, behind the ear hearing aids were finally powerful enough to allow me to wear them. My deafness also progressed to the point that I was profoundly deaf and hearing aids were no longer effective, especially when it came to speech discrimination.
One year and four months after my first CI surgery and activation, I am hearing sounds which were not even possible for me with hearing aids.
Hearing is no longer the exhausting experience it once was. I can sit in a meeting and hear every participant speak as if that person were sitting right next to me.
My world is noisy. It is about to become noisier. I am scheduled for surgery on Leap Year Day. I will be listening to the sounds of Spring with two cochlear implants, in both ears.
There are sounds which I don't like to hear. One in particular is listening to someone chewing and snapping gum as that person chews. I can hear the gum snapping as the person bites down on the piece of gum on the OTHER side of the wall. Another is listening to someone type on a computer keyboard in the same room while I am trying to concentrate on my own work.
When I was a hearing aid user, there was no way I could hear someone chewing gum on the other side of the wall, let alone hear the keys on a computer keyboard clicking as someone types. That's how effective cochlear implants are to me, studies or no studies!
I know over time, my brain will learn to tune out the annoying sounds. I just never thought as a cochlear implant user that I would welcome SILENCE.
What irony!
The difference between hearing aids and cochlear implants is just HUGE. "Life Changing" is SUCH an understatement.
I am still amazed at how deaf I am when I remove the cochlear implant sound processor at night before I go to bed.
Someone who is a cochlear implant user like myself, recently posted about what a great time it was to be deaf. I completely understood what she meant. There are so many options now for deaf people.
In spite of my now noisy world, gum chewing and all, Hearing is such a gift.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Lyrics sound like singing
Earlier this morning I had to go to the lab to have blood work done. For the first time in I don't know how long, the phlebotomist was able to draw blood from my left arm using a butterfly needle and tubing. I was elated. Usually when I have blood drawn, I have to have blood taken out of my hand or wrist.
As I returned to my car, I decided I would listen to a CD to brush up on listening to music with a cochlear implant. I didn't pay attention to the CD which I inserted into the CD player of my car. Imagine my surprise and delight when I recognized Tracy Chapman singing, "Talking about a Revolution!" For the first time since I received a CI, lyrics actually sounded like SINGING.
For me, that's HUGE. You are talking about someone who tested within the limits of the audiogram in April, 2010, fast-forward to February 2012, and I am hearing SINGING. Not scratchy voices with garbled lyrics, but SINGING.
Later tonight I listed to more of Tracy Chapman on my computer - one favorite song of mine is "Fast Car." I heard and saw "Fast Car," on music video television when Tracy Chapman first sang that song. I had never heard of her, but grew to like her music.
It has been a year and nearly four months since I received my first cochlear implant. It just goes to show you that I am still experiencing "soundflavorings anew." I continue to experience more "WOW!" moments as I progress on my journey hearing with a cochlear implant.
When the weather gets warmer, and it is late Spring, I will be hearing the sounds of Spring with two cochlear implants this time. I'm not in a patient, waiting frame of mind. More of an anticipation of what two cochlear implants will bring to my world.
Hearing is such a gift.
As I returned to my car, I decided I would listen to a CD to brush up on listening to music with a cochlear implant. I didn't pay attention to the CD which I inserted into the CD player of my car. Imagine my surprise and delight when I recognized Tracy Chapman singing, "Talking about a Revolution!" For the first time since I received a CI, lyrics actually sounded like SINGING.
For me, that's HUGE. You are talking about someone who tested within the limits of the audiogram in April, 2010, fast-forward to February 2012, and I am hearing SINGING. Not scratchy voices with garbled lyrics, but SINGING.
Later tonight I listed to more of Tracy Chapman on my computer - one favorite song of mine is "Fast Car." I heard and saw "Fast Car," on music video television when Tracy Chapman first sang that song. I had never heard of her, but grew to like her music.
It has been a year and nearly four months since I received my first cochlear implant. It just goes to show you that I am still experiencing "soundflavorings anew." I continue to experience more "WOW!" moments as I progress on my journey hearing with a cochlear implant.
When the weather gets warmer, and it is late Spring, I will be hearing the sounds of Spring with two cochlear implants this time. I'm not in a patient, waiting frame of mind. More of an anticipation of what two cochlear implants will bring to my world.
Hearing is such a gift.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Single-Sided Deafness
I saw my surgeon last month. He agreed I was a candidate for a second cochlear implant, this time in my right ear. I am scheduled for cochlear implantation surgery on the 29th of this month.
Since I was implanted in my left ear a year and three months ago, I have noticed I have become more sensitive to changes in the barometric changes of wind pressure. It affects balance on my right side and I don't feel as steady. When this happens, I adapt. I don't wear high heels, and I don't put myself in precarious situations which demand I concentrate on my balance. Walking on a balance beam is definitely not an option - I was horrible in gymnastics because of balance issues, so I am definitely NOT a gymnast. I am not using my elliptical machine. What I am doing, in preparation for surgery, is using the stairs at work and not the elevator. I have a railing to hold on to.
Those marble stairs in my office building are absolutely unforgiving. It is, however, a great cardiovascular workout. So even though I leave for work in the dark, and come home in the dark, I still must exercise. I still use the stairs.
It's funny. I wore a single body aid with a cord and a button ear mold in my left ear for 22 years. The summer I was to start my junior year in college, I needed new hearing aids. My audiologist told my parents that there were behind the ear hearing aids available for my hearing loss. She also suggested that I try wearing a behind the ear hearing aid in my right ear. I had never done that. Well, my parents purchased two behind the ear hearing aids and surprisingly, I adapted very quickly to a hearing aid in my right ear. From that point on, I hated it when one of my hearing aids needed repair and there was no loaner available. I would miss hearing in both ears and complain about what I refer to as "single-sided deafness."
I wore behind the ear hearing aids until November 2010, when I was activated in my left ear post-cochlear implantation. My audiologist told me to put away my hearing aids, she wanted me to learn to hear with only the cochlear implant sound processor for six months. That was one of the hardest things I have ever done, put away the hearing aids. Well, my hearing aids, being eight years old, died not long after that. I had three days of listening with the hearing aid after six months, and when I heard again with the hearing aid and the cochlear implant sound processor, it felt pretty unbalanced. I told my CI audiologist that I had a little taste of what hearing with two cochlear implants could be like. I told her I wanted a second cochlear implant as soon as possible.
As my hearing aids were eight years old, I didn't see much point in investing in another hearing aid when I had tested within the limits of the audiometer and got little benefit from a hearing aid. I have been functioning with just one cochlear implant.
In November, 2011, my CI audiologist evaluated me for a second CI implant and I met all the candidacy requirements and scheduled an appointment with my surgeon. The process was a lot quicker this time. I just needed a current audiogram for my right ear. That was done. As I had a CAT scan done in August 2010 for both ears, I didn't need that again. I also received a pneumonovax vaccine in August 2010. That vaccine is good for ten years.
My younger sister will once again be with me during surgery. We are spending the night at a local hotel the night before surgery, as I live two hours away and we didn't want to be stuck in traffic on the interstate the morning of surgery. The surgery will be done on an outpatient basis and we will return to the hotel after surgery and spend the night at the hotel again. Then in the morning post-surgery, my younger sister will drive me home and then she will drive herself home.
As I have learned to hear with a cochlear implant and lived with it for a year and three months, I am impatient to hear more. I am hungry for more sound. My new cochlear implant veteran friends who wear two cochlear implants tell me hearing with two "bionic" ears is just awesome.
I am really curious to find out if my brain has adapted to the cochlear implant. Will voices again sound like people talking underwater after activation day when I have my right ear activated? Or will my brain recognize sounds and voices right away?
I am a lot more excited this time around. I definitely want what I call "surround sound!"
Since I was implanted in my left ear a year and three months ago, I have noticed I have become more sensitive to changes in the barometric changes of wind pressure. It affects balance on my right side and I don't feel as steady. When this happens, I adapt. I don't wear high heels, and I don't put myself in precarious situations which demand I concentrate on my balance. Walking on a balance beam is definitely not an option - I was horrible in gymnastics because of balance issues, so I am definitely NOT a gymnast. I am not using my elliptical machine. What I am doing, in preparation for surgery, is using the stairs at work and not the elevator. I have a railing to hold on to.
Those marble stairs in my office building are absolutely unforgiving. It is, however, a great cardiovascular workout. So even though I leave for work in the dark, and come home in the dark, I still must exercise. I still use the stairs.
It's funny. I wore a single body aid with a cord and a button ear mold in my left ear for 22 years. The summer I was to start my junior year in college, I needed new hearing aids. My audiologist told my parents that there were behind the ear hearing aids available for my hearing loss. She also suggested that I try wearing a behind the ear hearing aid in my right ear. I had never done that. Well, my parents purchased two behind the ear hearing aids and surprisingly, I adapted very quickly to a hearing aid in my right ear. From that point on, I hated it when one of my hearing aids needed repair and there was no loaner available. I would miss hearing in both ears and complain about what I refer to as "single-sided deafness."
I wore behind the ear hearing aids until November 2010, when I was activated in my left ear post-cochlear implantation. My audiologist told me to put away my hearing aids, she wanted me to learn to hear with only the cochlear implant sound processor for six months. That was one of the hardest things I have ever done, put away the hearing aids. Well, my hearing aids, being eight years old, died not long after that. I had three days of listening with the hearing aid after six months, and when I heard again with the hearing aid and the cochlear implant sound processor, it felt pretty unbalanced. I told my CI audiologist that I had a little taste of what hearing with two cochlear implants could be like. I told her I wanted a second cochlear implant as soon as possible.
As my hearing aids were eight years old, I didn't see much point in investing in another hearing aid when I had tested within the limits of the audiometer and got little benefit from a hearing aid. I have been functioning with just one cochlear implant.
In November, 2011, my CI audiologist evaluated me for a second CI implant and I met all the candidacy requirements and scheduled an appointment with my surgeon. The process was a lot quicker this time. I just needed a current audiogram for my right ear. That was done. As I had a CAT scan done in August 2010 for both ears, I didn't need that again. I also received a pneumonovax vaccine in August 2010. That vaccine is good for ten years.
My younger sister will once again be with me during surgery. We are spending the night at a local hotel the night before surgery, as I live two hours away and we didn't want to be stuck in traffic on the interstate the morning of surgery. The surgery will be done on an outpatient basis and we will return to the hotel after surgery and spend the night at the hotel again. Then in the morning post-surgery, my younger sister will drive me home and then she will drive herself home.
As I have learned to hear with a cochlear implant and lived with it for a year and three months, I am impatient to hear more. I am hungry for more sound. My new cochlear implant veteran friends who wear two cochlear implants tell me hearing with two "bionic" ears is just awesome.
I am really curious to find out if my brain has adapted to the cochlear implant. Will voices again sound like people talking underwater after activation day when I have my right ear activated? Or will my brain recognize sounds and voices right away?
I am a lot more excited this time around. I definitely want what I call "surround sound!"
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