The Question: Do deaf people sleep better at night than hearing people?

I certainly can’t sleep with my CI/HA in and I love not hearing anything at night, BUT it means that the shock of the vibrating alarm when Abby shouts in the night is quite something!!! Also, I find that I am quite sensitive to light and have to make the room as dark as possible, I end up being an early riser in the summer and serial snooze-button user in the winter!!

Brilliant post for a morning!

I’ve had people vacuuming under my bed while I was asleep for the lolz – I didn’t wake up either time. A vacuum cleaner is usually making about 80dB of noise and our one is especially evil and loud (I can’t reliably tell if it’s on or off without hearing aids tho). My ex boyfriend snored shockingly, I couldn’t hear it, his next girlfriend who was hearing completely freaked out on him cos of the noise – that and his 7 alarm clocks going off suddenly one morning to (usually fail to) wake him up which I slept through 😉 I laughed!

I fell asleep in the bath once, bathroom light switch was INSIDE the bathroom. Cue partner and friend flicking the breaker on and off and using the smoke alarm self test as the only noise they could think of that I might hear. I think the light woke me, I could only just hear the smoke alarm outside the bathroom – it was quieter than tinnitus. I have great difficulty convincing hearies that that noise they can’t bear, barely registers for me without my hearing aid, which I like, I like the peace!

I am sensitive to vibration though, once stayed in a travel lodge near a motorway and the whole place shook constantly. I couldn’t sleep through the vibration which my hearing partner could barely notice.

Flashing lights don’t wake me up well, they make me hallucinate in a half asleep state. I banned them from the bedroom except for the now deaf-accessible fire alarm unit we have which also has a vibrator. Otherwise it’s vibrating alarm clocks all the way (yes yes I know vibrator hee hee to the members of the public at the back there chortling away). Partners do have to be tolerant of the alarm clocks which are pure evil.

Lol I can definitely sleep so well most nights! Like you said your post, people can’t sleep if they are stressed, medication etc. can be hard to make people sleep. I definitely can’t sleep if there is something bothering me.
Sometimes when I’m asleep and it’s raining, I don’t even hear the rain/thunder and my family complain about not having a good night’s sleep (my family are hearing) and I say to my family. “What? It was raining and there were thunders last night?” I didn’t even know that until they told me and when I have a peek outside. It makes me glad sometimes. But sometimes I can sleep in and miss out on my alarm, so there are pros and cons 🙂

An interesting question is posed here! I think it would depend on the degree of deafness that would make it a case of: can sleep or can’t sleep.

As Iam profoundly deaf I can sleep through a thunderstorm without so much as stirring! However, I suffer from chronic tinnitus, so getting to sleep is a massive problem!

Once I have managed to nod off Iam fine and being a deep sleeper, I suppose, helps.

Hearing friends sometimes complain and ask me: “Did u hear that thunderstorm last night?” I reply: “what thunderstorm?” I haven’t a clue! They envy me the fact I can sleep through anything, so if a hearing man has problems with a hearing wife because he’s a dreadful snorer, get divorced and marry me, you’ll be fine for the rest of your sleeping life!!!

Interesting as a hearing friend of mine believes that deaf people get a better night’s sleep than hearing people, but as Charlie says in his article, it is not just sleeping in a “golden silence” that ensures a good sleep; deaf people are thought to suffer more mental health problems due to isolation, loneliness and this can perhaps manifest in disturbed sleep patterns. Equally, I am easily disturnbed by someone switching the light on; I’m instantly awake, and also any vibration or sudden unexpected movement. When I was younger, no-one explained to me that my grandmother would be sharing the bed with me one night – I come from a large Irish family where squeezing in at big family events was quite the norm – but it didn’t prepare me for one of the shocks of my life, thinking there was a monster in my bed and causing me to leap across the room in fright! That I still remember that to this day shows how powerful the effect of being unexpectedly being woken in your sleep can be! One thing that bother me is this: the number of hearing people that complain about their partner snoring….why is nothing done about the snoring????

I’m rapidly going deaf, with no hearing in my right ear and little in my left and hadn’t really thought about this conundrum until now. Guess what, I dream with sound! So when I’m asleep, I hear….. in a strange sort of way! :-/ but not really! 60 years of sound has left a lasting memory. I suppose this would be different for people who have been Deaf from a pre-linguistic time!?

As for snoring, it’s not the noise that’s the problem, it’s the vacuum caused when she snores! It sucks the pillow from under my head! 🙁

I think you will find not all deaf people sleep well at night. Interesting, the author is able to hear the smoke alarm without aids….just. I can’t hear anything without hearing aids.

I accept for many, that lack of hearing anything helps them sleep. I have a different problem though, for many years I found I was a very aggressive person, I would change at the smallest of things into a not-so-nice type. I saw lots of other negative traits such as being grumpy, lack of concentration, impatient, always tired. I also believed I had a lovely long sleep at night and some days could be hard to wake in the morning. As a child, nightmares were common as was deciding to crawl into my parents bed. In my thirties I finally worked out what was causing this. I found I was waking up every fifteen minutes or so as I was scared I would not hear if the smoke alarm went off, an intruder broke in, the alarm clock or my work trying to contact me. I was not aware of waking up but this was enough for me to not go into a deep sleep…..causing the symptoms and many more that I’ve already described. I have since met many other deaf people that have the same issue or have the symptoms without realising they have the issue.

Now I have identified this and have a solution that gives me the confidence I won’t have these fears, I have found I get the best of both worlds….I can’t hear anything to disturb my sleep but will wake up if there is a sound I need to know about.

I am profoundly deaf, a light sleeper, and super sensitive to vibration. I sometimes have a hard time falling asleep because I can hear low-frequency/high-dB sounds and strong vibrations like trains, loud cars and trucks, even snoring, thunder, etc. Once I fall asleep and it is quiet, these things do not usually wake me up. But if I wake up, and there’s noise/vibration, I can’t return to sleep. I HAVE been woken up by heavy trains, thunder, and gunshots though. I once went through two months of insomnia until I figured out it was the AC unit running outside my bedroom window that was keeping me awake! I moved to a different bedroom.

Please don’t be offended by my next statement I am a hearing adult who’s wife is also a hearing adult……..your article is particularly poigniant as my wife snores very loudly but has done so for 20 yrs……believe me when I say I wish I was deaf at night and hearing through the day……I have worn foam inserts in my ears at night for near 20 yrs and I can even hear her through them……..right now I’m lay in the spare room, just so I may get some sleep and I’m not usually a light sleeper but I feel my wife’s snoring is getting worse and my sleep pattern is, at best disturbed and at times nonexistent……..so to answer your question just about everyone sleeps better than me, no matter how hearing or deaf they may or not be

I used to be jealous of my hearing brother being woken up by thunderstorms as I missed all the excitement of lighting, the colours and the clouds. He used to be jealous of me sleeping through! Suppose can’t win! 🙂

My family along with 3 Millions of Sudeten-Germans were being expelled from our homes. We transported on open cattle cars. Only I slept soundly. The rhythm of the cho-cho kept me sleepy, while it was disturbing everyone in the train. Only when the train was braking, generating screeching vibration, I woke up. This surprised my folks, thinking I was suddenly cured of deafness.

Another incident, later I woke up in the middle of the night and woke up my brothers, reporting to have “heard” a unusual hum of low frequency. My brothers thought I was hallucinating.

I usually would continue sleeping, even when I felt people’s steps walking into my bedroom, felt air whooshing into the room, as long as I could identify what they were. I could sleep with the light on, but if the room is dark, I would wake up when a light flashes or passes me, as if coming from a flashlight. A moving light around me would be a signal, to me, to which I must wake up to find out what happens.

I never though of this question before but it got me thinking and interested to know the answer. Thank you for sharing the answer with us I think that the best person to answer this question is someone deaf like you. I envy you for that matter because I’m also very sensitive to noise when I sleep the slightest noise can wake me up and I wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep.You can consider yourself lucky again because a lot of women hate it when their man snores so I’m pretty sure you and your wife would have a more harmonious marriage compared to other couples. I wish the both of you all the best!