Full Hearing Potential

Hearing aid maintenance requires new earmolds periodically. I am in the process of relocating to South side of Chicago, so my Audiologist arranged for my records and earmold that was made to be sent to the Downtown Chicago office and I had an appointment on Wednesday to pick it up, and go on my way with life.

The new Audiologist, who has requested I call him just Larry, is a "maverick" of the hearing aid world, according to my old audiologist. Turns out he was her graduate mentor when she was attending Northwestern University.

His approach to new patients is different than that of the other 4 Audiologists I have had since I moved from AZ. He started a consultation type visit and about 20 minutes into it I had to cut it off since I had a job interview for a full time gig (I KNOW! It rains it pours. More on that in a sec). Before leaving, he had reviewed my hearing aid settings and "tweaked" two settings. One setting I liked better, and the other was atrocious. It was a mic and phone mode operating at the same time, and the background noise I don't normally hear on the phone was so loud I couldn't understand the caller.

We switched the settings back to what I previously had, or so we thought. I leave, and come to find out now the phone mode is on Automatic, and swapping in and out of phone mode on its own. The degree of error for the motion sensor is absolute crap and so I had to tell my team leader for my gig that I was going to have to go back in, and have it turned off. It took 2 visits back over the course of the afternoon to convince Larry I wasn't crazy about my Tcoil settings being on the hearing aid, and a call to my old audiologist cleared up the confusion. Life is good, except I had to have C call the company I was supposed to be interviewing at and tell them I had a medical emergency that was making me unable to keep the appointment.

Then things get interesting. Without the interview hanging over my head and clear from the office until I reached out to them again, Larry and I picked up the consultation again. He inquired into why I'd never been fitted with a hearing aid for my left side. I told him that according to my parents (just verified this with my mom last night) that it was thought that amplification of such a severe and profound hearing loss would just confuse and disrupt my right ear, so they never tried.

Larry wants to try. He bet me a nickel he could get the hearing in my left ear stronger than that in my right. Those of you who know me well and have had a conversation to my left ear without my knowledge, know how tall a claim this is.

He asked to do a hearing test on left ear to start fresh and come up with a plan. The hearing test didn't register audible comprehension of the sound, but it did register recognition of sound waves.We talked about what that meant in terms of potential - the physical parts are working, its the nerves that conduct the signals that are super super weak.

So.... for almost 30 years I've accepted something as just a matter of fact for my life. Now someone is saying that there's hope. That I could in fact have stereo hearing and be even more functional. The left ear will never be as good as the right, that we both agree.

In order to take this on, we're embarking on a Physical Therapy regimen for my left ear, to use a common analogy. We made an earmold last week, and I go back to pick that up Wednesday and bring one of my old aids with me. Making that earmold fucking HURT, where on the right side I've had them for so long it doesn't hurt at all. Larry will be turning the aid down significantly, to start to reteach that ear that it is supposed to be pulling some weight and start to respond to the auditory signals.

I'm so super super curious to see an fMRI of my brain right now. It would have been interesting to see before/after meningitis CT scans too - I am sure they're in my file somewhere but I couldn't find them in the records my parents had at home. This whole PT transition thing could possibly take 6 months to a year to start to really see long lasting results.

I'd be crazy not to try, right? At this point it is costing me about $100 for the new earmold, and then having to buy batteries for the older aide since they use a different size than my current aid.

I would like to think I've adapted pretty well to my disability. While on the surface it feels like YAY! more hearing! I will admit I hesitated once I got home. PT hurts. Any time changes are made to my hearing aid I have migraines for a week. The question then becomes.. will the pain net any measurable and long lasting result? Is this all just someone talking big dreams and that's why he only bet me a nickel?