Been Quiet Around Here Lately

It’s been quiet around here the last few days.

My hearing aid broke on Thursday, New Year’s Eve, around 2:30 PM. After removing every single speck of ear wax from the ear mold, changing the battery three times, checking the volume and settings a dozen times and even taking the ear mold off the hearing aid (the aid will emit a squealing noise if there’s no ear mold attached), I reluctantly came to the conclusion that the hearing aid was dead. Very, very, very dead. Because it didn’t work without the ear mold on I deduced it was a problem with the hearing aid itself, probably something electrical.

Unfortunately, that meant I couldn’t fix it myself. I immediately called the clinic, where the audiologists I work with are located. They were both on vacation until Monday. No, the receptionist informed me, they didn’t leave any instructions for what to do in case of an emergency, say, like, your hearing aid goes completely kaput.

Great.

Next, I called Miracle-Ear and two other for-profit hearing aid places. All were gone for the holiday weekend.

By the time I dialed the number for the last place, a Beltone Hearing Center where an elderly sounding lady told me that the audiologist was out and besides, they didn’t have loaner hearing aids, I was steeling for the harsh reality: I would have to spend the next four days without my hearing aid, without being able to hear.

It’s Sunday night now and I think, I hope, I pray this ordeal is almost over. I think that’s why I am allowing myself to write about this. I am planning to be at the clinic tomorrow morning at 8:00 AM when the audiologists first get there and I am not leaving without a loaner.

These past four days have been hard. They weren’t hard like “going through chemo” hard or “starving children in Africa” hard, but they were hard.

I have an 80% loss in my right ear (basically deaf) and don’t wear an aid in that ear because it doesn’t do much good. I have a 60% loss in my left ear but when properly aided, I hear pretty close to normal on that side. Hearing is a form of communication and when my left hearing aid, my gateway to the hearing world, was taken away, part of my world shut down.

In some ways, I’ve felt a lot like I did when I was a quadriplegic and basically “locked in”. I hesitate to refer to myself as having “locked in” syndrome because I was able to communicate using my eyes, lips, facial muscles, head and neck, to some extent. I was not the classic case of being “locked in”but I was close enough that the rehab staff told my family to read The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. I communicated by mouthing words and hoping and praying people could read lips, which was hit and miss (mostly miss). Otherwise, we used a letter board, something like this one. My mom or dad, the ones who were with me the most in the hospital, would start at “A” and go through the alphabet until I found the letter I wanted. Then I would blink or nod my head vigorously. Letter by letter I would spell out words and sentences. Yes, it was tedious. Yes, it was frustrating. If I could’ve talked, I would’ve been screaming and crying about how hard it was. I didn’t have a choice, though.

I didn’t have a choice this weekend, either. I’ve tried to make the best of the situation. I got a bunch of DVDs and watched them on my laptop with closed captioning and headphones. (If I put the sound right next to my ear, I can hear it. It’s kind of like being nearsighted.) Then the laptop crashed.

You. Have. Got. To. Be. Kidding. Me!

I can’t take any more technical snafus. I’ve had it. I’m planning to be at the audiologist’s office tomorrow when they open at 8:00 AM and I’m not leaving until they give me a loaner hearing aid. Yeah, we’ll see how that goes.

I’m starting to feel nostalgic for 2009…

Photo credit: If Only I Had Super Powers