What made you guys decide to get a hearing aid? My main trouble is in a room with other sounds. In a room with me and 2 others, I am okay. The frequency of me saying, “say again” is increasing.
Member
What made you guys decide to get a hearing aid? My main trouble is in a room with other sounds. In a room with me and 2 others, I am okay. The frequency of me saying, “say again” is increasing.
Moderator
Honestly, what you describe is a major reason I finally got checked out in detail and got my aids...my hearing wasn't "bothering" me in quiet environments and in general life, but it was very difficult to deal with speech in noisy environments. Restaurants were sometimes the worst. Now part of that with me was that my right side had significant hearing loss, especially in some frequency ranges. That affects spatial perception as well as differentiation with noise and speech a great deal. The hearing test was really "ear opening", as it were. Now I had my testing at Costco as noted and what they do is load the suggested program into a pair and have you walk around the store for awhile to see if one is comfortable with the suggested initial programming before you even pay for the aids. So Professor Dr. SWMBO and I did just that. I immediately noticed I was heating things in the store I had never heard before...little things like some kid on the other side of the store and the air handlers up above. Sound was "sharper" and "richer". But as we walked and talked, I suddenly realized that she was on my right side and I could hear her perfectly in normal conversation. (could be both a good thing and a bad thing...LOLOriginally Posted by Ed Gibbons
) Seriously, I couldn't wait to get back to the hearing department and order those suckers...
I still really appreciate the difference between with and without. My shop is a good example. I have REALLY good acoustics in my shop because of the ceiling material. When I'm doing normal, non-noisy stuff, my aids are working normally and even the sound system really sounds good including full frequency ranges. As soon as I prepare for something noisy by turning the volume on my aids to zero , it's like I stepped into a muffled pillow tunnel. It's dramatic. Who knew?
Last edited by Jim Becker; 12-31-2020 at 10:24 AM.
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The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...
Member
Jim,
What is an internal rechargeable battery?
Thanks for the feedback.
Ed
Moderator
My aids do not need me to buy and put batteries in them...they are like a wireless phone. They get set in a magnetic charger at night to be brought back to full capacity. No dealing with those little batteries that this thread originated discussing. Aids that use the little batteries cost a few hundred less, but the convenience is absolutely worth it, IMHO, especially after seeing the challenges my mother faced with the little batteries when she was still alive. So I paid $1800 instead of $1500 and that was a good deal to me!
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The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...
Member
My IPhone charges the same way. Definitely worth it. Thanks again for the info.
Contributor
My mother wore aids for the last 20+ years of her life. The audiologists all urged her to wear the aids all day long, not just out in public. They said that if the brain gets used to not hearing certain frequencies, you will lose that part of the range permanently.
I must say we watch all TV with closed captioning now, which helps when one can hear well, and the other not.
Contributor
Stan, I am deaf hearing with the aid of a cochlear implant and a hearing aid.
There is a theory that the brain has a "hearing memory" that can be harnessed to assist those with a cochlear implant. My implant has 16 electrodes that stimulate the auditory nerve in my left cochlea. Those 16 electrodes replace the approximately 21,000 "hairs" believed to stimulate the same nerve in a normal functioning cochlea. The frequencies heard are positional sensitive within the snail shell shaped cochlea with the high frequencies being sensed near the base and the low frequencies sensed near the apex. One can' t realistically expect that 16 electrodes can exactly replace and provide the same frequency response or hearing that 21,000 "hairs" can. Most cochlear implant recipients report a loss of low frequency hearing. I wear what was said to be the strongest hearing aid on the market on my right ear. With it that ear tests at around 16% of normal hearing, however, it does provide a certain amount of lower frequency hearing providing me a sense of directional hearing at certain frequencies. The only reason that ear hasn't been implanted is that I have to sleep without either ear given the aid of my CI sound processor or my hearing aid. In the event one of an alarm such as a smoke detector going off if I was sleeping on left side, which I seldom do, I might hear the alarm. It's a very small chance as that ear tests deaf without the HA.
That being said, when I go a few months without listening to my huge stash of rock music CDs from the mid 60's though the mid 70's, I have to relearn to hear the lower frequencies but eventually do. As deaf person who uses both a CI and a HA, I agree with your Mom's doctors advice, it's important to employ what ever hearing one has to keep it practiced!
Last edited by Ken Fitzgerald; 01-04-2021 at 8:31 PM.
Ken
So much to learn, so little time.....
Contributor
Good luck to you Ken. I'd like to blame my rock 'n' roll years for my hearing loss, but I'm afraid it runs in the family.
Moderator
I'm finding that wearing my aids "full time" as much as possible is actually helping my right ear "learn" how to deal with certain frequencies that were missing, but that could be specific to my issue in that ear. I do occasionally take a day off to "air out" my ear canals, especially if I'm going to be in the shop making noise and turning them off anyway most of the time.
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The most expensive tool is the one you buy "cheaply" and often...
Contributor
Stan, I have Meniere's disease which not only robbed me of my hearing but effects my balance as well. I have to take a prescription diuretic pill to hold off severe vertigo attacks. The last time I read up on it, they thought it wasn't hereditary but my brother has it, takes the same diuretic as me I do but hasn't lost his hearing.
Ken
So much to learn, so little time.....
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