Activation!!

Audiofuzzy said:
I am majorly undecided at this point about CI, I want it and yet I am scared of it. Right now I know what I have, and migraine plays a big role as well. Although I know Vallee's migs improved after implanting I am worried it may not work for me so well because sound is a big trigger to me.
I think I will put it (CI) away for a while, still.
But I love to read about people's successes with CI.

I have a question, too, if I may... Since probably all of you can say the hearing is much better with CI, aren't you sorry you didn't get the CI years before?

Fuzzy
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Fuzzy dear, I can say that I wish I got my left ear done a long time ago since I would have lost nothing having it done but if I made that decision back then, the technology would have been different and perhaps I wouldn't have appreciated it as much as I do now. It is a catch 22. It would have been a totally different experience all together. It was just my time to embrace technology, and when and if your time comes, I hope it is all worth it for you.
 
My fourth mapping went well! I'm digging the music program over my base program (my everyday program). I love the wider dynamic range and voices sound pretty. Voices stand out for me in the car regardless of road noise and music. In the beginning, my Audi stuck me in the booth did a tone, sentence and word test. I scored 44% on my sentences compared to 0% pre-activation. The word tests, lets just say I need some work LOL, I only got four right. She said that they do not normally do this kind of tests until 3 months after activation. I am ecstatic with the results!

Since I liked the IDR of 80 and the music program, she tweaked the music program and added higher frequencies to it to become my base program. Now paper and plastic are loud again Voices sound much crisper. She went through some sentences covering her mouth and I got every single one with the high frequency emphasis. She lowered the volume to 306 to eliminate the twitch. The last time I went she went through each electrode raising the volume and it wasn't one electrode. The conclusion that it just might be a few of them that are causes the problem, and the combinations are endless. She programmed me with my hearing aid in to see if I necessarily need all that volume in my left ear and so far, it is working out well. If I take one or the other off, everything is very soft. Perhaps my brain is getting use to having two ears again. The next time I go to see her is when an Advanced Bionic audiologist is present, which is going to be within the next two weeks, so once I find out when the audiologist is available I will let you all know.

Overall, this nifty little gadget impresses me every single day. This weekend I was cleaning out the shed and my neighbor came over and we are bs'ing. I heard two DISTINCT voices that were male or very deep voices from a woman. Anyway, they were two guys on the roof of my neighbor’s house that is a good 80 feet away. Whereas I could not hear anything before that was 8 feet away much less 80 feet. After I got home, my mom practiced saying some sentences with her mouth covered with the TV on. I did fairly well.
 
That's a great sentence testing result so early on Contradica! :) And I'm glad you heard the birds :) Way to go! Hope that the twitch problem sorts itself eventually. Maybe it's just one of those things as you get used to tolerating louder sounds again?

I'm looking forward to my remap take 2 tomorrow and hopefully my stronger magnets will be there. I'm loving my two ears at the moment though :)
 
contradica said:
R2D2,
I heard birds yesterday! From the sounds of the, I heard three different ones. I was waiting outside and playing with my dog and I heard squawks, I stopped and I was like I'll be damned, birds. We don't get many cockatoos around here. The only cockatoos I see are in cages. We have blue jays, cardinals, robins, pigeons and seagulls. I have no idea which one of those I heard though, I can only pick out seagulls.
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Now you make me want to go up to my parents' farm to listen to the birds. Where I live there is heavy traffic so I'm able to pick out the sound of individual motors becaue traffic is so constant.

When I wore HAs, the only birds I could pick out were mourning doves and blue jays.
 
I had my take 2 map today and the new #6 strength magnets did make a difference this time! We remapped both ears as my first implant had begun to sound quiet again. After that, we did some sentence tests by listening to a CD playing from the speakers on her computer. On my newly implanted ear I got 48%, up from 4% immediately upon activation 5 weeks ago. I was happy with that considering that I haven't got around to practising very much and considering it wasn't a very good ear with the hearing aid. My first ear by itself got 82% and together it was 84%. It would be interesting to do the same tests in noisy conditions to see if it makes a difference having two ears because in real life, I feel that it does.

Next map will be in 6 weeks on Dec 3rd - just in time for the start of the summer holidays! :)
 
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