Listen (Five Minute Friday)

**9/16/16 - edited to fix the description of good ear vs bad ear and the location of my helper. Short story: helper brings bad ear up to similar level of "good" ear so that I sort of have stereo hearing like most folks.




HA HA HA HA. I am chuckling to myself - out loud - as I see the prompt for this week emerge. Big news in my home this week, and I was debating how widely I would share it. Then the prompt arrived: LISTEN. And I thought - well there's my answer.

This week, I got a hearing aid. I know hearing isn't the same as listening - words can go in one ear and out the other as we wait for our time to respond. People can hear what you say and not process it - not give it credibilty  - and therefore they're really not listening to you.  You can hear and not listen. In fact, that's fairly easy - and common - especially when you're in a hurry, or too many kids are talking at the same time, or there are things to do, or .. or .. or...

BUT - it is much harder to listen if you cannot hear. I've had significant hearing loss in one ear for several years. Onset in my early 20s and progressed after each pregnancy. Until the past year or so, my good ear could bridge the gap in what my bad ear failed to hear. And so, if I positioned myself in a group with the good ear towards the conversation - if I sat close to the people I needed to hear when we were in a crowded setting - if I turned down the TV when the kids were talking to me - then I was doing OK. I could hear the important stuff.

In the last year, the good ear started to worsen. (thanks random genetic condition that no one in my family actually has/had noticeable symptoms other than me, as far as I know...) I had to ask the girls to repeat themselves often. To the point of their frustration and mine. Driving somewhere in the car was awful, as the road noise filled the "good" ear and the kids had to shout from the back seat. They sometimes even gave up trying to get me to understand them, as the repeating was tiresome. We finally resorted to ... stop, come to mommy and look me in the eyes so I can watch your mouth while you talk." Not fun, right? Terrible when driving. Horrible when outside in the yard.

So, I decided that turning 40 was my cue to finally do something about it. I now have a wonderful (and very small! You might not notice it, if I didn't even point it out!) helper. It assists the "bad" ear back to a level that it hasn't known in some time. So the "good" ear doesn't have to work so hard - and so I hear stuff on both sides. And when I came home with my helper on Tuesday, I noticed a difference right away. The girls can be behind me and I can hear them. Whispers - I can hear them! We watched TV (the Nats were on) and instead of the volume up so loud that the kids can hardly tolerate it and I could barely hear it (17-20 on the dial) we can watch the game on level 6!!! The girls turned on the TV and started to raise the sound, and I had to say TURN IT DOWN. They were thrilled. Dinner conversation has been easier. We can talk when driving to soccer practice. (There's even a special program in my helper to extra dampen the road noise so the kids can talk in normal volumes in the car).

I hear keys clacking on a keyboard. Water boiling on the stove. Plastic bags rustling in the pantry. Sounds I had forgotten even existed.  I can watch a movie and not have to sit 2 inches from the TV to be able to keep the sound at a level that doesn't wake the girls after bedtime. It is remarkable how much I was missing and didn't even know, as I've been used to life without it for so long.

For the first time in years, the girls feel like I am available to listen to everything they want to share - because they, and I, no longer have to work so hard at the hearing part.

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