Hearing Loss

So you may have noticed something different about my last few Fierce Friday photos. I wear standard tubed behind the ear hearing aids and you can see them in the photos. Before this past Fierce Friday, I took them off for all of my blog photos. Actually, I took them off for all of my photos in general. I really dislike the assumptions I get from other people when I wear them so I often don't - even in situations where I clearly need them. In fact, plenty of people who know me are surprised to discover that I have a hearing loss because I don't wear my hearing aids and I'm really good at faking it. But you know what? My hearing aids make my life easier and it's ridiculous to take them off because of other people's opinions. So I'm not doing that anymore. Besides, hearing aids are totally fierce. Right?

Anyway, about my hearing loss…

I was born with "severe" sensorineural hearing loss. That's the kind of hearing loss that's due to problems of the inner ear and nerves. In my case, demented cochlear hair cells and a cochlear nerve that occasionally decides not to fire. As far as I can tell, my cochlear hair cells make up the bulk of my hearing loss and the nerve leads to occasional moments when the world suddenly goes silent, only to come back a few minutes later when my cochlear nerve decides to start working again. I have several relatives with the same type of hearing loss so it runs in the family.

Meme that says "When people yawn do deaf people think they are screaming?" (The answer is no.)

I also have tinnitus, which essentially means I hear a high-pitched ringing noise all of the time. Usually when I tell people about this they assume it must be incredibly annoying, but since it has always been there it just seems normal for me. I really only pay attention to it at night when I take out my hearing aids for bed.

Deaf movie parody "Clash of the Tinnitus" has a man in titans outfit holding his ear
and looking upset while a doctor looks at him with her hand over her mouth. 

My hearing loss was diagnosed when I went to kindergarten at age five. From there it was a brief stint of ASL and years of speech therapy so I could continue to be mainstreamed. Think years of carefully memorizing mouth/lip/tongue positions for sounds you can't distinguish at all, lots of picture cards, and occasional playroom breaks with the severe intellectually disabled kid in the same time slot. Luckily for me I rock at lip reading so I did well in school. I do wish they hadn't dropped the ASL though, since I remember it being way easier than spoken English.

Speech therapy cartoon showing Yoda trying to read "I have an apple" and instead saying "An apple I have."

Basically, a full day of having to hear is exhausting. To cope with it, I've steered myself into jobs with no phone use and few coworkers to minimize the amount of hearing I need to do. I also avoid parties, bars, and other noisy situations because my ability to hear there is essentially zero so there's no point in going. I do best one-on-one in a quiet environment where I can lipread. When I was younger I assumed I was an introvert since socializing is exhausting but now I think that was hearing loss rather than introversion. I keep intending to learn ASL - maybe this summer?

White lips that say "Will it help if I shout" on them in black letters. 

Anyway now you know about my hearing loss. I doubt it'll become a main thing in this blog but I'll probably post about it randomly from time to time.