My journey toward recognizing my hearing loss

I have always known I was blind, there’s no hiding that. I have always known I was hearing impaired also, but for a long time I didn’t recognize the significance of it. I’ve worn hearing aids for as long as i can remember. I remember as a little kid getting the hearing aids pinned to my shirt so I wouldn’t throw them. Growing up I was able to do pretty well in school with the help of an FM system which consisted of a mic and transmitter the teacher would wear and a receiver I would wear. I am sure the technology is way more advanced now. I didn’t really think about my hearing loss growing up. In college I soon realized I preferred less background noise so I could actually speak with people, but I still didn’t think about my hearing loss much and went about my life. Sometimes I faked that I could hear more than I did, but for some reason I never told people I had a hearing loss even though my loss is quite severe. I think we all have a tendency to hide our limitations from others. Then a member of the blind community said I was deaf blind. She explained that anyone with any amount of vision and hearing loss was considered deaf blind. At first I resisted this, because I could hear pretty well even though I really couldn’t, and my hearing loss didn’t affect me or so I thought. The more I thought about it the more I realized she was right. This started the journey of coming to terms with my hearing loss.

Shortly after that, I qualified for a cochlear implant. That is worth a separate post all to itself, but let’s just say it was a rocky road. Once I finally got comfortable with it, I realized how much I was missing out on before. My usable hearing still fluctuates based on the amount of background noise and sometimes even the acoustics of the rooom. But now I am more willing to admit to others that I have a hearing loss. It just makes things go a lot smoother when people know and can give me that extra grace. I find that most people don’t mind repeating themselves, especially those who are my friends. I would encourage those who have a hearing loss to not try to hide it, but admit it and seek treatment for it. It will make your life a lot easier.