When I was 18 months old, I was diagnosed with moderate-to-severe bilateral, sensorineural hearing loss. In human terms, I am partially deaf in both ears. I've lived for over 25 years as a person with hearing aids in a mainstream world. However, it has been a long journey to get to where I am today.
Due to the lateness of being diagnosed, it was all hands on deck to get me ready for the world in the best situation that it can be. I pretty much started straight away at Shepherd Centre, Sydney in the early intervention program. When I was 2½, I went off to my first day of hearing impaired school at my local primary school. This was a new unit that was being opened up and I was one of the first students. At first I was going to two different schools with focus on sounds, speech and articulation. Although I almost got expelled from one of the schools as I wasn’t that quick to let someone know that I needed to go to the toilet.. Ops.
Once it got to preschool age (4/5) I was doing a few hours a day at the local preschool to prepare me into normal schooling. While in Kindergarten it was decided to give me a further challenge, several classes a day in a regular public school. I was seeing a speech therapist regularly to help with my speech, my parents had found a great lady to see her outside of school hours. I also had hearing support help at school right up till I finished year 12.
Once I started year 4, I started feeling more and more self-conscious about having a hearing impairment. I found I was only using my FM set when it was absolutely necessary and would constantly say “I left it at home”, I was also having speech-therapy sessions before school and would try and skip it as I would rather play sport with the other kids.
My hearing aid has allowed me to work out how to distinguish sounds from one another more clearly. And I've become really good at reading people's lips! It's a technique that I adopted at a very early age and will use for the rest of my life, regardless of my hearing capabilities. My friends can't get over how I can pretty much watch people have conversations across the room and absorb what they're saying. It became very handy while living abroad or working in a sales role.
With the advance technology constantly changing, two years ago I have the change to replace my latest hearing aids to be even more advanced. Thanks to the government changes of Australian hearing can provide till 26 instead of 21. I found that this new advanced digital hearing aid was more powerful than my last one. It became very tiring trying to adjust to the new hearing aids mainly due to the sound that was being made aware. Small sounds that we take for granted that I was able to hear such as hair rubbing against the hearing aid, sound of the fridge, the PA announcements at the shopping centre. While I found the food court at the shopping centre way too amplified and would turn them off but leave them in my ear.
I decide to go to uni, to finish a degree that I had been completing via open uni and working full time. It was an exciting time and nerve racking. I had to constantly explain my deafness to everyone that I meet, including my roommates. However I could still hear the loud music that would be played till early hours so ended up having to switch apartments to a quieter unit. Much better!
It is interesting to note, that when I when I know that I'll be in a new environment, I tend to wear my hair down so that it covers my hearing aid. This way I know that people will treat me like any other person and not judge me before they talk to me. Don't get me wrong, I have much more confidence than when I was in school. I don't have any problems talking about my hearing impairment, and in fact, I would much rather have people ask me questions than talk about it behind my back.
Last year I decided to volunteer for one week at the Shepherd Centre, Sydney to give thanks to all their help. I found it very rewarding, from learning about what the family and children go through in the different stages, to seeing babies as young as 6 months getting fitted with hearing aids or even to being able to share my story to other families. Families would ask if I have time for a few questions such as “how did you overcome bulling?” or “Can you have a relationship?” or “How do you cope in the working environment?” Many questions that I tried to answer positively while telling as much as I can. I kept emphasising to the families that as much as the child is getting the help outside of home, it is important to put it in place at home. But at the same time not to treat the child any differently. A fine balance.
Check out my blog
The privilege to hear - About
Due to the lateness of being diagnosed, it was all hands on deck to get me ready for the world in the best situation that it can be. I pretty much started straight away at Shepherd Centre, Sydney in the early intervention program. When I was 2½, I went off to my first day of hearing impaired school at my local primary school. This was a new unit that was being opened up and I was one of the first students. At first I was going to two different schools with focus on sounds, speech and articulation. Although I almost got expelled from one of the schools as I wasn’t that quick to let someone know that I needed to go to the toilet.. Ops.
Once it got to preschool age (4/5) I was doing a few hours a day at the local preschool to prepare me into normal schooling. While in Kindergarten it was decided to give me a further challenge, several classes a day in a regular public school. I was seeing a speech therapist regularly to help with my speech, my parents had found a great lady to see her outside of school hours. I also had hearing support help at school right up till I finished year 12.
Once I started year 4, I started feeling more and more self-conscious about having a hearing impairment. I found I was only using my FM set when it was absolutely necessary and would constantly say “I left it at home”, I was also having speech-therapy sessions before school and would try and skip it as I would rather play sport with the other kids.
My hearing aid has allowed me to work out how to distinguish sounds from one another more clearly. And I've become really good at reading people's lips! It's a technique that I adopted at a very early age and will use for the rest of my life, regardless of my hearing capabilities. My friends can't get over how I can pretty much watch people have conversations across the room and absorb what they're saying. It became very handy while living abroad or working in a sales role.
With the advance technology constantly changing, two years ago I have the change to replace my latest hearing aids to be even more advanced. Thanks to the government changes of Australian hearing can provide till 26 instead of 21. I found that this new advanced digital hearing aid was more powerful than my last one. It became very tiring trying to adjust to the new hearing aids mainly due to the sound that was being made aware. Small sounds that we take for granted that I was able to hear such as hair rubbing against the hearing aid, sound of the fridge, the PA announcements at the shopping centre. While I found the food court at the shopping centre way too amplified and would turn them off but leave them in my ear.
I decide to go to uni, to finish a degree that I had been completing via open uni and working full time. It was an exciting time and nerve racking. I had to constantly explain my deafness to everyone that I meet, including my roommates. However I could still hear the loud music that would be played till early hours so ended up having to switch apartments to a quieter unit. Much better!
It is interesting to note, that when I when I know that I'll be in a new environment, I tend to wear my hair down so that it covers my hearing aid. This way I know that people will treat me like any other person and not judge me before they talk to me. Don't get me wrong, I have much more confidence than when I was in school. I don't have any problems talking about my hearing impairment, and in fact, I would much rather have people ask me questions than talk about it behind my back.
Last year I decided to volunteer for one week at the Shepherd Centre, Sydney to give thanks to all their help. I found it very rewarding, from learning about what the family and children go through in the different stages, to seeing babies as young as 6 months getting fitted with hearing aids or even to being able to share my story to other families. Families would ask if I have time for a few questions such as “how did you overcome bulling?” or “Can you have a relationship?” or “How do you cope in the working environment?” Many questions that I tried to answer positively while telling as much as I can. I kept emphasising to the families that as much as the child is getting the help outside of home, it is important to put it in place at home. But at the same time not to treat the child any differently. A fine balance.
Check out my blog
The privilege to hear - About
