Every weekend, we are publishing popular articles from our archive, which you might have missed the first time round! Tell us which articles you think should be reposted by emailingthelimpingchicken@gmail.com
I was born deaf. Although both of my parents were deaf, because I responded to some sounds, nobody realised that I was partially deaf for around a year. Or maybe it was two years – I was too young to know exactly how long.
It was only when my speech didn’t develop that my hearing was tested – and I was found to be moderate to severely deaf. After that, I was fitted with hearing aids.
I didn’t like hearing aids at first, and I once tried to flush them down the toilet, which left my mum with a very messy job on her hands.
They felt uncomfortable, and I remember taking them off whenever I could.
But in time, with the passing of weeks and months, they became normal.
They started to feel snug and warm, and comfortable, and I could tell which ear they were meant to go on just by how they felt in my hands as I picked them up.
I’ve worn hearing aids nearly all my life and it’s not always been easy. At school, I struggled to hear people whispering in class, or jokes above the lunchtime hustle and bustle. I still struggle in noisy environments. The rush of the wind or the sound of whistling feedback can be excruciating to hear.
But lately, I’ve started to realise that in some ways, I’ve had a big advantage.
When I listen to elderly people (who have lost some of their hearing with age) talking about the way their hearing aids sound, and the struggle they go through just to get used to them, I realise how hard it must be to adapt to artificial hearing when you’ve been used to hearing naturally.
I’ve heard elderly people complaining about the sound of the cutlery drawer in their kitchens, or the sound of traffic.
To me, it’s just how hearing aids sound. To them, it’s unpleasant and distracting – something that, in some cases, is enough to make them give up wearing their hearing aids for good.
It’s not just hearing aid users who face this challenge of adapting. Some of my close friends have been fitted with cochlear implants, and I’ve found out just how much work they have to do to make sense of the sounds they hear.
Which is why I think I’m the lucky one, because I’ve never had to adapt. I’ve had over 30 years to get used to how hearing aids sound. I’ve been trained to hear this way.
I believe that if I had been born hearing, and became deaf now, at the age of 32, or later in life, and started wearing hearing aids, I would find adapting much, much harder.
What do you think, is it really harder to start wearing hearing aids in old age? Tell us below.
The Limping Chicken is the UK’s deaf blogs and news website, and is the world’s most popular deaf blog.
Make sure you never miss a post by finding out how to follow us, and don’t forget to check out what our supporters provide:
- Phonak: innovative technology and products in hearing acoustics
- Ai-Live: Live captions and transcripts
- Bellman: hearing loss solutions
- Deaf Umbrella: sign language interpreting and communications support
- SignVideo: Instant BSL video interpreting online
- 121 Captions: captioning and speech-to-text services
- Doncaster School for the Deaf: education for Deaf children
- Signworld: online BSL learning and teaching materials
- Exeter Deaf Academy: education for Deaf children
- SignHealth: healthcare charity for Deaf people
- Lipspeaker UK: specialist lipspeaking support
- CJ Interpreting: communication support in BSL
- SDHH: Deaf television programmes online
- Sign Solutions:, language and learning
- Sign Lingual: BSL interpreting and communication services
- Action Deafness Communications: sign language and Red Dot online video interpreting
- Hamilton Lodge School in Brighton: education for Deaf children
- RAD: financial advice for Deaf people
- cSeeker: Online booking for communication support
- Krazy Kat: visual theatre with BSL
- Enable Support Services: Supporting Deaf children and adults in Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk
- Sign Language Days: Sign language learning in schools
Enjoying our eggs? Support The Limping Chicken:
The Limping Chicken is the world's most popular Deaf blog, and is edited by Deaf journalist, screenwriter and director Charlie Swinbourne.
Our posts represent the opinions of blog authors, they do not represent the site's views or those of the site's editor. Posting a blog does not imply agreement with a blog's content. Read our disclaimer here and read our privacy policy here.
Find out how to write for us by clicking here, and how to follow us by clicking here.
The site exists thanks to our supporters. Check them out below:
- BSL Zone: TV programmes in BSL for the Deaf community
- Deaf Umbrella: what support is available for deaf students?
- Bellman & Symfon: home alerting solutions, including the mobile phone transceiver!
- SignVideo: Instant BSL video interpreting online
- SignHealth: check out the BSL health library
- 999 BSL: call 999 in an emergency, in BSL
- Appa: Looking for RSLIs, TSLIs and CSWs, apply here!
- Signly: Adding BSL to websites
- Signworld: Learn BSL online!
- DCAL: world-class research into deafness, cognition and language
- Action Deafness: “A Deaf-Led Charity” – interpreting & community support services
- Sign Solutions: Instant access to Interpreters, training and BSL translation nationwide
- InterpretersLive: On demand BSL video interpretation
- Lipspeaker UK: specialist lipspeaking support
- BID: Deaf services, including advice and support, interpreting, employment and letters
- Performance Interpreting: BSL interpreting at concerts
- National Deaf Children's Society: The leading charity for deaf children
Andy not him, me.
January 17, 2015
Unfortunately you are oversimplifying the situation. Firstly, whether a hearing aid is any use at all is a matter of luck. Hearing aids cannot compensate for all types of hearing loss. For an unlucky few they are a waste of time.
People with severe hearing loss in the upper registers are typically difficult to fit with a hearing aid because they just don’t have the bits for hearing higher frequency sound. This is the most common form of severe hearing loss. The ski slope. In any case a new hearing aid takes some years to completely get used to, recently deafened people have to go all through that learning stage and it takes a longer rather than shorter time to get used to the strange noises produced by a hearing aid. They are hardly hi-fi!
In your case you probably have some hearing at all frequencies and the hearing aid can be adjusted to compensate. This is the best kind of hearing loss to have because hearing aids can often compensate for all the loss, not just bits of it. I suspect that this is the type of hearing loss that hearing aid designers have in mind when they first plan a new aid.
In the case of your CI friends who are struggling, are they people who were born deaf?
It is a known fact that born deaf people have the additional disadvantage of not having experienced sound, either at all or partially.
If you compare with hearing babies, it takes them a couple of years of hearing speech before they feel the urge to make speech of their own. Born deaf people don’t have that stage (but partially hearing children do) and so if they get a CI they have to go through the process of recognising the nature of sound and responding to it. This takes longer than for people with some memory of sound. It is an important distinction.
So you see it isn’t quite as simple as you might think!
Cathy
January 17, 2015
I have not read this one before, so it was interesting to read. I can certainly relate to this as I went deaf aged 4 and have therefore grown up using hearing aids.
I can well understand that they would not be easy to adapt to for adults going deaf. Such things as the traffic would be horrendous because hearing aids amplify everything instead of giving better clarity and precision. This is why it is so difficult to adapt…….
I, too am grateful, for the fact I went deaf in infancy rather than an adult, as I doubt very much I would cope with hearing aids now. Adaptation is also the main reason I have not gone for a cochlear implant, after wearing hearing aids virtually my whole life suddenly adapting to a different way of hearing seems daunting and frightening! What if my brain didnt adapt? There is no way back from a CI! I also learned that such sounds as crisp packets was horrendous!!! So those aspects put me off entirely.
But just like the author here Iam eternally grateful that I grew up with hearing aids so I have assimilated with them rather than accommodated them!!
Lu
January 17, 2015
It’s probably different for everyone- depending on circumstances, personality, type of deafness as well as age. Both my mother and I wear hearing aids – she’s 65 and I’m 36. I’ve worn mine for a year and have progressive sensorineural deafness. Hers is age-related – I’ve forgotten the name! – and she was prescribed them about 4 years ago. We’ve both had problems but changing audiologists has been the best thing we’ve done – and we don’t live in the same area. Finding someone who is helpful, informative and empathetic is the best thing you can do – particularly when it’s all new and you are so clueless and trying to deal with the deafness itself.