Gael Hannan

Gael Hannan is an author, speaker and advocate on hearing loss issues. In addition to her weekly blog at the Better Hearing Consumer, which has a passionate international following, Gael has written two acclaimed books, “The Way I Hear It: A Life with Hearing Loss”and “Hear & Beyond: Live Skillfully with Hearing Loss”, written with Shari Eberts. She is regularly invited to present her uniquely humorous and insightful work to appreciative audiences around the world. Gael has received many awards for her work that advocates for individuals to become more knowledgeable and successful at dealing with their hearing loss and a more inclusive society for them to live in.

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I Don’t Know What to Say About Tinnitus

I don’t know what to say about tinnitus because it’s an ornery beast. I don’t even like to say the word (tinnitus), because it responds to its name with even more loudness. OK, maybe I can say a few words about it. Tinnitus is annoying, frustrating, loud, keeps mixing up the sounds and moving from one side to another. It

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We Hear Better When People Speak Better

The salesperson is facing you. There is almost no background noise and you’re wearing your hearing devices. Since it’s just the two of you, this is shaping up to be an accessible conversation. Then she starts to speak and you realize that all the bad speaking habits seemed to be rolled up in this woman. She speaks softly, her lips

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What Did You Miss When You Pretended to Hear?

People with hearing loss are cheaters. Well, most of us are. And we don’t cheat all the time – just when other people are talking to us. Which is a lot of the time. But saying that we’re cheaters doesn’t mean we’re not nice people. Most of us are fabulous! We just have a little problem: ‘fessing up when we’re

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Hearing Loss Technology: Got it? Flaunt it!

Hearing aids have yet to reach the same level of high fashion as eyeglasses. But they’ve come a long, long way and so has public attitude towards them. But until recently, personal hearing technology was still big and ugly, which helped explain the distaste that people had for using them. At least, that’s how I felt when I got my

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Having Hearing Loss in a Hearing World

Do you ever wonder where you and your hearing loss belong? When trying to adjust to life with hearing loss, many people say they feel caught between two worlds – the Deaf world and the Hearing world. They feel they don’t fit in with either the world of people who don’t hear anything or in the world of people who

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Is It Time to Take a Hearing Loss Selfie?

Whether you’ve had hearing loss for a year, a decade or a lifetime, it’s easy to get sloppy on the basics. Maybe we’ve become a little careless with our technical devices (as if they cost a few bucks rather than a few hundred or thousand). Maybe we’ve been backsliding to the days when we tuned out people and activities because

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What (Still) Makes Me Nervous about Hearing Loss

Most days I feel like I’ve got this hearing loss thing licked. After all, I’ve had it for six decades, I write about it regularly and I talk about it all the time. I share tips I’ve learned from other people and I make up my own. I OWN my hearing loss. My mission for these past few years has

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Why You Should Love Your Audiologist

On your list of favorite people, your audiologist probably won’t make the Top 10. But he or she should be #11 or something close to it. But maybe we should be talking about a different list – perhaps the Top 10 People Who Help Make My Life Better. Studies show that around 20% of people who would benefit from

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Unique Facts About People with Hearing Loss

People with hearing loss are just like other people, except that we don’t hear very well or at all. If you don’t have hearing loss, it’s difficult to grasp what it’s really like. Here a few things that might give you a better insight into our life. When we speak loudly, we’re not aware of it. But you, unfortunately, are. We

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Stop Trash-Talking Telecoils!

I don’t know how to say this more clearly: Telecoils in my hearing aids have made my life better. Better, happier, easier, and more connected. And I’m not the only one – there are gazillions of us. Because of this positive experience, it’s frustrating for us – the hearing loss advocates and international organizations – to hear that audiologists are advising