I'm in a lovely neighborhood. I was speaking with one of the women when we first moved in and explained I had a hearing loss. Her response was something like, "Don't we all?" There's just a basic ignorance out there but with me in the neighborhood, I am teaching people. Doug no longer yells out to me
. He knows louder doesn't mean more clear. He waits for me to be near him. Colin will always be impossible to understand. He's cute, tall, has a mustache that covers his lips, talks fast and mumbles. He has a Scottish accent but with the CI that accent disappeared. I don't know why but the only person's accent I can detect is his wife's. But I guess I'll have to listen to her with my eyes closed next time to understand if I can really detect it.
YES, hearing (or not) is extremely stressful. Had we stayed in NY (outside the city), I would likely really be dead by now. Getting used to the CI may never happen, so that is stressful on another level.
Watch:
1. I'm at IBM standing next to my shorter manager. I turn whichever ear towards her to h e a r. Barbara grabbed my shoulders and turned me around to face her. She thought I was ignoring her. I was @24 years old. She did not understand and it was similar to the experience I had with my kindergarten teacher.
2. I eventually dated a guy in my apt. complex. But, I ran down my apt. steps (I just did it naturally) and the guy told me he thought I was a snob because he'd say, "Hi," and I'd ignore him. He learned otherwise.
3. When you have a little hearing, I know I'm not unique here, you listen for cadence, intonation, # of syllables and add in any trick you've learned to understand. You are always slightly behind in a conversation. I called it lag time. But until you reach severe to profound, you can sort of guess what people are saying. DOING THAT all day long (and I had a commute) in the business world is exasperating and tiring.
4. This reminds me of the lovely poem someone wrote. Last week, my partner and I are walking around the neighborhood. A friend pulls over to talk. They talk about going to a movie on Xmas day. My partner (of 21.5 years) said I shot her a dirty look and she opted out of the movie. I had to explain (I wrote incredulously) the dirty look may have been due to twisting my face to hear or not beep or anything except what she said. So, it's true we get most of our cues from reading body language. But I suggest that when we are HoH or Deaf, those cues are different from those who can hear. Now convince someone who is hearing of that.
Stressful? Aghhhhhhhh...... Yeah, and that's what walking Marcus is about (unwinding for me and peeing on everything for him) and it's what riding my motorcycle and hiking in the Blue Ridge is about - unwinding. I said before CI is a world unto itself and is also stressful in other ways. I can't get the intonation, so I have to find other ways to process info.
