HELP IN DESPERATE TIMES

“Blindness separates people from things; deafness separates people from people.” 

~  Helen Keller  ~

New hearing aids were tried out but the interval between visits to fine tune them was four months each. It could take just a day to realize that what works in a soundproof room may not in a home or restaurant. Subtle tweaking was needed but there was nothing subtle about waiting in the knowledge that my lifeline was not at its best. I arranged for my audiology needs to be transferred back to my local hospital. Now I was a stranger there but at least I still had contacts. The receptionist was new and I was a stranger on my home ground. The waiting was shorter but the action was modest and a functional compromise. Soon the stapedectomy got less effective. It took a while to understand if it was me or the technology. Colds, throat infections or sinus trouble had a dramatic effect on my ability to hear. The consensus was that it was me and now my left ear decided it didn’t want to work at all. I can see now that without the surgery I would have nothing working on either side.

Travelling on the bus one day, I put my bus pass on the plate and the red light came on. It should have gone green but this time something was wrong. I tried several times but all with the same result. After a while I looked up at the driver to ask what he will do about it. I saw on his face the unmistakable expression of exasperation! I didn’t need to hear him, I could clearly lip read the words. “MOVE ON DOWN THE BUS, IT IS NOT WORKING TODAY, MOVE ON DOWN THE BUS.”

Whilst I was looking forwards at the ticket machine he had been speaking to me from the side. Obviously telling me he knew it was not working so I may pass on. What he didn’t know, was that I could not hear from that direction, I could not hear above the noise of the engine, I could not look, hear and talk at the same time. He was polite in his words, I will give him that, but his manner and body language gave away his true feelings. I said something like “not everyone can hear what you say” and moved on down the bus. A queue had formed behind me and I had upset it. The bus would be fifteen seconds late because of me! But why did I feel like the one at fault. A note on the machine would have solved the crisis but …….!

I was in the queue at the till in my local supermarket. Minding my own business, it was not quite my turn yet. From behind someone pushed my shoulder. The suddenness and unexpected action nearly knocked me off my feet. Naturally I looked around to see what had happened only to be greeted by a very large man who said directly into my face “YOU DEAF OR JUST STUPID?” He had obviously said something to me and had been ignored, perhaps repeatedly. I mumbled “I am deaf, which are you?” and promptly moved ahead to pack my things (and get out of the way of his potential physical response). I do not know what it was all about, it was never explained, repeated or expanded upon nor was it evident in anyway what I had done to offend him.

Like the previous occasion, I did not look deaf. I still do not know how to! This is the problem when in public amongst strangers. When working I sometimes finished the day and would get a compliment from someone who did not realise that I was deaf until they were told by someone else. I thought such things were good, to be told that I do very well with my disability. Whenever I attended the hospital for appointments when my audiogram was looked at I would get the response “you do very well with so little hearing!” but I was naive.  Whereas at first I concealed it, then I ignored it, now I could not avoid it. It needed to be acknowledged.

I was NOT a normal person who cannot hear sometimes, I was a DEAF person who can sometimes hear.

So at one of my routine follow-up appointments this had to be said. I had improved one ear in one way but not fully. I had lost the other ear now completely. I was back at the beginning only having reversed the sides affected. A fast-track repeat of my tests to see how much things had changed was offered but this time a cochlear implant would be the only answer. The nerve conduction test was not included. When I got to the speech recognition test my first score was now twenty percent and there was no point in carrying on with the second half. They already knew  I could do better.
It would have been nice to see how much better my lip reading had become though.