October 9, 2006
After a few weeks wait, my hearing aids have arrived. At the audiologist's office I am fitted with two behind the ear (BTE) type hearing aids. Surprisingly, they are easy to put in and feel very comfortable. There are small buttons that switch the hearing aid settings between three options: Program 1 (Front microphone only - my most powerful setting) Program 2 (front and back microphones are turned on - used for noisy settings like a restaurant. It seems counterintuitive but turning on more microphones actually dampens the extra noise.) Program 3 (T switch- used for talking on the telephone or when an assistive listening device is available like in a theatre).
As soon as I have my hearing aids in I am amazed at how much louder speech is. Both my voice and the audiologist's are easier to hear. As I walk down the office hallway to see the otolaryngologist next I am surprised at how loud my flip flop sandals sound. Can everyone else hear how loud my shoes are?
The doctor is pleased that I have been fitted with the hearing aids and that my throat infections are clearing up from the antibiotics he prescribed.
When I leave the office I am startled by how loud the outside world is. As I drive home, I discover that cars make a swooshing noise as they pass your car. Have they always done this? When I arrive home I take a walk in my neighborhood and enjoy the awakening of my senses. I remember when I was a child and received my first pair of eyeglasses. Suddenly I found out that it was possible to see individual leaves on trees where there had only been a blur. My walk that day felt much like that experience.
Monday, July 14, 2008
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4 comments:
Hi my name is Liz and I'm HOH since around Autumn 2002. I've been wearing hearing aids ever since. I've just stumbled over your blog tonight and will carry on viewing it. Looks good.
I have 2 blogs myself that I'm new at. One's associated with my deafness and the other belongs to my cat Lady. Hope you'll like mine, as much as I like yours!
Hi Liz,
Welcome to my blog. I just checked out your deaf blog. It's great.
Thank God for the internet so we can connect even though we're an ocean apart.
Cheers! Sarah
Hi speakup librarian,
Just found your blog too... I'm not HOH, but work with technology for people with disabilities and have dabbled with using speech recognition for captioning / transcription.
Your line about getting glasses and seeing the leaves on the tree is so true -- I have the exact same memory! I remember my first pair of glasses at ten, and being overwhelmed at the detail and beauty of everything. I stared out my front window for hours that day.
And of course, I have a blog too. The Liberated Learning is the project I'm involved in re: speech recognition as transcription.
http://chadleaman.wordpress.com/
And finally, Ken and Tina will win and live happily ever after. :-)
Hi Chad,
Welcome to my blog!!!
I visited your blog this morning and the website for the Neil Squire Society. One of my professional interests is in making distance education accessible to people with disabilities. Your work with Wimba and speech recognition is very interesting to me. I have been thinking about accessibility in terms of podcasting. You are working on the live teaching part. I attended a webinar on Using Wimba to Provide Equal Access of Information to Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students in On-line Courses that you might be interested in. Do you have an email address where I could contact you? You can reach me at speakuplibrarian@yahoo.com.
Sarah
P.S. I still think Nick and Starr will win it all.
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