Author: Vera

Implanted

~ Vera ~ 33 Comments

Huge news.  I have a cochlear implant.  I went into hospital Thursday morning, operation in the afternoon, stayed in overnight, X-rays Friday morning to check that all looks OK in there, discharged early afternoon.  “Switch on” is planned for three weeks’ time.  I have a slightly sore right side of the face (nothing serious) and I’m a bit unsteady on my legs still, but otherwise OK.  The best bit was when the consultant checked the X-rays, declared them fine, and called me over to see a tiny, tiny implant (like a plastic thread, with electrode dots on it) curled up nicely in my cochlea.

The plan is to blog throughout the process of the coming months, whilst I learn to hear again.  Interspersed with that will be some retrospectives about what’s been happening over the summer.  It’s hard to know where to begin on that.  Suffice it to say, for the moment, that things never did fully recover after my blocked ears saga. It felt like they were heading that way, but I never got back the level of hearing I’d had before that virus in January.

I’ll tell you the full story another time.

Right now I’m off to curl up with a book.

Idea

~ Vera ~ 10 Comments

In her comment on The Last Post Joy suggested finding some means to enable followers of the blog to keep in touch; for mutual support and camaraderie or, as she later put it in an email, “for sharing the difficult moments but also the hilarious ones”.  Sound like a good idea?  I thought so.  Indeed, a great idea.  As a result, I’ve set up a Facebook group for followers of morethanabitdeaf.

I’ve set it up as a closed group, which means that only members can see the posts.  Hope you might think about joining.  So far the four of us who have started it off share the statistically unlikely characteristic of all having black dogs (the canine sort, not depression) so you could join us just to even up the demographic profile.

If you have a Facebook account you can find the group by following the link https//www.facebook.com/groups/morethanabitdeaf/?ref=group_cover

If you don’t currently use Facebook – I didn’t until comparatively recently – it’s easy to join and you can use your membership just to join groups you are interested in.  You don’t need to post to your own page (I don’t) but I joined UK Hearing Loss Community and Hearing Loss Worldwide, both of which are very much worth a look.  Once you have a Facebook account (it’s free) you can ask to join the morethanabitdeaf group and I will add you.  Simple.

Maybe see you on Facebook then…..

 

 

 

The last post (for a while anyway)

~ Vera ~ 15 Comments

I’ve decided to take a bit of a break from blogging.  When I started More Than A Bit Deaf in February 2016 I thought I’d keep going for six months, or perhaps a year.  It’s been longer than that and I’ve reached the point (54 posts later) where I feel in need of a blogging vacation.  Rather than a long list of topics jostling for attention in my “ideas” folder it’s more “hmmm, long overdue for a post – what can I say that I haven’t said before?”  So time to stop for a while.  I don’t want to bore you.

I am keeping the site, in the expectation of returning at some stage, so please don’t unsubscribe if you might want to hear from me again.  I’m also planning to still occasionally write for other deafness/hearing loss media and (with a bit of luck) they might sometimes publish things – so keep an eye out.

THANK YOU for reading.  Thank you for the feedback; whether that’s comments on the blog, or e mails, or talking about it when you see me.

To people who can hear – the best thing has been people telling me they understand a little more about what hearing loss is like.

To people who can’t – those of you who’ve said I’ve managed to capture some of the things that YOU experience and feel have given ME a big boost.

Au revoir then.  See you again.

Here I am, heading off down the lane for a walk with Izzy

 

Ratchet up the bravery setting

~ Vera ~ 2 Comments

One of the best things I’ve read about deafness recently is on the SayWhatClub website.  Michele Linder and Chelle Wyatt (Michele and Chelle) write posts about lip reading but, as they rightly point out, you can’t lip read unless people are looking at you, speaking at a reasonable speed, standing in a good light (and so on) and THAT doesn’t happen, more often than not, unless we take charge of the situation and ask for what we need.  So their latest post is less about the mechanics of lip reading and more about how comfortable we are (or are not) with our hearing loss and making other people aware of it.

That’s a big topic.  Continue reading →

Eating whilst deaf

~ Vera ~ 10 Comments
Copyright: bbbar / 123RF Stock Photo

I probably wouldn’t be big on eating out even if my hearing was good (I love to cook) but meals out when you can’t hear certainly have their challenges.

Problem one – Busy, noisy pubs, restaurants and cafes with lots of hard surfaces for the sound to bounce off (tiled floors, tables without table cloths, windows without curtains).  It’s hard to believe the difference that soft furnishings make to speech comprehension if you have hearing loss, but it’s true.  They absorb a lot of the clatter and make speech much easier to understand.  Open plan restaurant kitchens are a particular disaster – all that rattling of pots and pans and the shriek of the coffee machines.  I’m picturing Pizza Express as I write this.  I like Pizza Express, but the acoustics can be terrible.  Continue reading →

Bing bong

~ Vera ~ 6 Comments

One minor casualty of our building works is that the doorbell stopped working.  It was at least twenty five years old so it didn’t owe us anything, but it had an excellent sound for me – a deep, long, loud buzzing – and it was a shame to lose it.  I resolved to look up what was available in the Action on Hearing Loss catalogue but before I got round to that a couple of minor problems occurred.  Nigel left his keys at home one day and had to resort to ferocious banging on the front door to get my attention (scarred by previous experiences, he knows there is no point knocking politely).  Continue reading →

Deaf at the dentist, and other random things that have been going on

~ Vera ~ 8 Comments
Copyright: maximillion / 123RF Stock Photo

Recently I had a check-up at the dentist.  Dentists’ surgeries are not hearing-loss-friendly environments.  The main problem is the dentist’s mask.  Lip reading?  Impossible.  Then there are all those hygienic hard surfaces, perfect for creating a noisy, echoing environment and disastrous, therefore, for making sense of speech.  Also presenting a challenge are the plastic goggles they give you when water-spray equipment is being used in your mouth. Continue reading →

Tips for hospital waiting rooms

~ Vera ~ 14 Comments
Copyright: neyro2008 / 123RF Stock Photo

Last week I had my follow up appointment at the Ear Nose and Throat Department, after my blocked ears saga.  The outcome of the visit was that I was referred for another cochlear impact assessment, of which more in another post some other time. Today’s post is about the process of waiting and queuing,

I arrived at the hospital incredibly early because parking is a nightmare.  Public transport isn’t an option.  From where I live it would mean taking two buses and one train, with a probable journey time of about two and a half hours each way.  That’s if you ever got there at all. Continue reading →

My thoughts on Parliament’s adjournment debate about NICE’s cochlear implant rules

~ Vera ~ 6 Comments

Whoah – what a long title.  Today’s blog comes to you courtesy of the Limping Chicken – the world’s most popular deaf blog, laying eggs every weekday.  Last Friday they published my post on the above (thank you Limping Chicken).  Here’s what I said…..

It’s not often that Parliament debates deafness, so Friday 24 March was important; an adjournment debate* discussed whether the current rules set by NICE, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, are preventing some adults who would benefit from a cochlear implant from receiving one. Continue reading →

Just a little thing

~ Vera ~ 8 Comments
Copyright: iimages / 123RF Stock Photo

I used to have a work colleague who complained about people saying “could you just?” at work.  Could you just check this over for me?  Could you just remind me how to do Y?  He complained that the sum total of the “could you just” demands on him made big inroads into his productive work time.  One “could you just” was such a little thing – how could you refuse?  But they add up.

Sometimes I feel a similar thing about the minor irritants of deafness.  One such thing – poof! – it’s nothing, taking no time to sort out.  But the drip, drip, drip of a series of minor irritants – well, that can get you down.

My recent example of this is so trivial I’m almost embarrassed to tell you about it, but here goes. Continue reading →