Adjustment to late onset deafness

I've came to appreciate flexibilty as I've watched the previous generation age. Lots of issues and adjustments. Attitude is everything.

The first location is really far from my home. At least an hour of freeway driving one way. I live in the city and this location is another town in the neighboring county. The metro Houston area is about 10,000 square miles which includes 10 counties. How crazy is that! Houstonians never learned to build up, just out! Talk about urban sprawl.

The second link is for classes in Dallas. Looks like a great organization!

I'm not discouraged. I'll figure out something. I've been told that the deaf school offers classes in the summer but I'm not sure in what city.

If you find any other info, please send it my way. I'm going to ask around and contact some county sources. There is a deaf church near my home but they don't offer classes. I'm sure that I can find people to practice with there, though.
 
sallylou said:
I've came to appreciate flexibilty as I've watched the previous generation age. Lots of issues and adjustments. Attitude is everything.

The first location is really far from my home. At least an hour of freeway driving one way. I live in the city and this location is another town in the neighboring county. The metro Houston area is about 10,000 square miles which includes 10 counties. How crazy is that! Houstonians never learned to build up, just out! Talk about urban sprawl.

The second link is for classes in Dallas. Looks like a great organization!

I'm not discouraged. I'll figure out something. I've been told that the deaf school offers classes in the summer but I'm not sure in what city.

If you find any other info, please send it my way. I'm going to ask around and contact some county sources. There is a deaf church near my home but they don't offer classes. I'm sure that I can find people to practice with there, though.
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Got a webcam?

If jclarke and an exchange student I taught can learn ASL within a year without formal classes... I am sure someone can help you over the Internet.
 
souggy said:
Got a webcam?

If jclarke and an exchange student I taught can learn ASL within a year without formal classes... I am sure someone can help you over the Internet.
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I am hoping I can get some others besides LDNanna to help me while on P3 call with my webcam. I am also thinking about making a video or two to post here and get comments.
 
I have a webcam and I'd love to learn with anyone who wants to practice.
 
TXgolfer said:
The first hearing loss I noticed each time was in the lows....
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Hum, that is where my loss is too, it is subtle, -10ish tell about 8k, then it goes up to normal hearing. So everything but the annoying sounds are dimmed down. When I read about others loss, it always seems the other way around; they have the lower freq, but no high. I thought I was the only one that is backwards, lol.


After grilling my mother about how she started losing hers in her late 20’s, she really doesn’t know. She was told that her aunt had a bone growth that slowly closed off her ear canal, so she think s it is that, but never has checked into it. I personally have about 3 months before I can get medical coverage and my new job, so I will check into it then. Since your audiogram works close to mine (save the stronger curve), I will have them check into that perilymph fistula. Though I doubt it would be hereditary, unless it is a thin wall that is hereditary and tearing is easier or something.

Also, for those that had read about my issues with getting into a signing class to try to learn, I was able to get into a class starting January.
 
Congrats on getting in a class.

It probably isn't the PF like you say but it never hurts to check. Could be Auto-Immune too.

Good Luck
 
Hi. Some folks pointed me here from a main forum when I introduced myself there. I guess I should probably introduce myself here before I start posting. I'll go into detail more than on the other forum. (You can skim or skip it if it's too long.)

My name is Allen. I'm 23 and late deafened.

I was born hearing and became deaf for a year when I was in kindergarten.
My mother took me to the doctor because one of my teachers thought I was autistic. I was always a strange child, so my mother was surprised and momentarily relieved to learn I was deaf. The doctor had no idea why it happened. I went through numerous ENT, ID, and audiology appointments but still no clear cause. Then all of the I sudden got my hearing back... though it took a while for everyone else to figure out because I still didn't respond when people called my name. :giggle:

I've used BSL as a kid, so I took ASL in high school because and I wanted to become an interpreter. I planned to go to CSUN to take Deaf Studies with a concentration on interpreting. However, I became ill in high school. My doctor at the time couldn't figure out what was wrong but I had a lot of inflamation so she gave me a high dose of aspirin. I'd never taken asprin before so I didn't know I was allergic. I got really bad tinnitus. It eventually went away for the most part but I was left with unilaterial hearing loss. About a year later it became evident that I had been loosing my hearing slowly due to complications from Still's Disease.

I was upset at first when I was becoming deaf. Luckily, I didn't really get the chance to be depressed. A high school ASL teacher told me, "Well you sign so it's not a big deal. Plus, now you'll pay attention in class".:roll: I went to CSUN anyway for the first two year of college and took Deaf Studies-Human Services Option. I didn't really notice my hearing loss as much while I was there because most people I encountered regularly there signed or were deaf and the school was accommodating. I was actually thankful to be deaf because aside from ASL my friends taught me regular communication skills which for some reason or other I'd simply failed to learn.

I moved back to San Francisco two years ago to finish my degree (now Social Work). I don't really have any deaf friends here and most of my friends here don't sign and because I speech read and guess well they sometimes forget I'm can't hear. However, I'm working on them! I've slowly trained them to automatically walk on my left side. Hehe... but it IS training! They usually forget why they're on my left other than it seems odd to be on my right.:giggle:

Recently though I found out I've lost a bit of my peripheral vision. Apparently my ocular pressure is too high and my optic nerve is thinning so I'm a high risk for becoming blind. Being deaf never was very scary to me but loosing my sight is causing me to be anxious, worried, and depressed at times. I'm an artist and also speech reading is my main way of communicating with my lazy but lovable signing impaired friends (as well as the rest of the hearing world). It's also been a bit of a hazard lately since my service dog has developed selective hearing... so she'll continue to lead me into an intersection because the signal is chirping even if she hears cars turning right from behind us. :eek2:
 
Welcome Vivid! :welcome:

Souggy, I have no idea how good my web cam is. I have one that is built into my lap top. If it's not good enough, I'll get another one. My hubby is the computer guy around here.
 
ms_redcat said:
Huh. I'm really noticing how, well, medical this thread is compared to the rest of the boards!

It seems like whenever I meet another HOH in adulthood or late-deafened person, we ask each other the medical stuff right away. Then we talk about that in great detail. The Deaf people I know don't seem to ask much about that (I have no idea why my aunt's friends are deaf, or most of my teachers. It seems like -- guessing here! -- it's not a forbidden topic, it's just not relevant/interesting in everyday life?)

Honestly, right now the medical stuff is VERY relevant to me -- I used to be an active, athletic person, and now it's sometimes just exhausting to stand up.

Would we like to start a separate medical/health thread?
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I think this is part of grieving . The first thing you wanna know is why? or what happened? Parents go through the same thing, but people (who grew up deaf or severe HOH) like me cared less the cause of our deafness because It's kinda hard to grieve over something that you never had (hearing). And I think it is also because it seem like a strange phenomenon that people just sudden go deaf after being hearing all their life. Most people think that deafness start at birth.

Although, I do want to point out we have discussed medical reasons for our deafness before.
 
Lighthouse77 said:
I think this is part of grieving . The first thing you wanna know is why? or what happened? Parents go through the same thing, but people (who grew up deaf or severe HOH) like me cared less the cause of our deafness because It's kinda hard to grieve over something that you never had (hearing). And I think it is also because it seem like a strange phenomenon that people just sudden go deaf after being hearing all their life. Most people think that deafness start at birth.

Although, I do want to point out we have discussed medical reasons for our deafness before.
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I've noticed that too. Hearing people almost always ask me the cause of my hearing loss and Deaf/HOH people almost never do.
 
Lighthouse77 said:
Although, I do want to point out we have discussed medical reasons for our deafness before.
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The Deaf/HOH people I know might eventually ask, but it's not one of the first things that comes up in conversation the way it usually is with hearing people.

On the other hand, every blind person I've met in person or online has asked me the cause of my blindness.
 
well, last night hubby and I were watching a movie and I was glad were able to keep going back and forth because even with the volume turned up I kept asking him what they were saying and he would ask me the same<he was wearing his headphones> He doesn't like captions though cause he doesn't see them well.

why do you think is the difference with people who are blind asking about someone else's blindness vs. the Deaf/hearing thing?
 
I found alot of people don't ask other person what the causes of their near or farsighted when they are wear glasses. Or lost their hearing due to aging. But as far as blindness, I do wonder if anyone is born with blindness (if they are, is it common like deaf people or rare). Maybe that has to do with it.
 
dogmom said:
well, last night hubby and I were watching a movie and I was glad were able to keep going back and forth because even with the volume turned up I kept asking him what they were saying and he would ask me the same<he was wearing his headphones> He doesn't like captions though cause he doesn't see them well.

why do you think is the difference with people who are blind asking about someone else's blindness vs. the Deaf/hearing thing?
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I think it might have something to do with the fact that the cause can help with knowing how the person sees. For example Retinitis Pigmentosa starts out as night blindness, then leads to tunnel vision, and eventually total blindness, which, as a part of Usher's Syndrome, is common in the Deafblind community. I'm not sure though, maybe it's just cultural differences.
 
CJB said:
The Deaf/HOH people I know might eventually ask, but it's not one of the first things that comes up in conversation the way it usually is with hearing people.

On the other hand, every blind person I've met in person or online has asked me the cause of my blindness.
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You have never asked me. But I will tell you I have Ocular Histoplasmosis Syndrome as a cause of blindness.


And I don't ask anyone anywhere why they are blind. Or why they are deaf.

If they want to tell me it is ok.
 
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