Better Hearing Consumer

People with hearing loss today understand that we thrive at the mercy of technology. We are battery-operated people. We need electricity to charge our devices. Technology rules! I’m no tech wiz but I’m OK with the basics – the microwave, for example, although last night I did manage to crack the glass plate, and I know what buttons to push

Tinnitus can be a cruel and constant companion. Some people who have tinnitus (very few, I suspect) have been able to consider their head-sounds as music. If what I hear every second of every day is music, then I want to put another quarter in my head’s jukebox and play something else. And the music I’d pick is silence. When looking

A few years ago, I wrote The Shocking Truths About Hearing Loss. I decided to revisit it and to see if these ‘truths’ still have the power to shock – even me, a lifelong bearer of hearing loss. They do. But they also bring gifts. Hearing loss is one of those ‘forever things’. It reveals itself to you every day,

“I can hear better than when I could hear!” My friend Alex messaged me yesterday with the news; he had finally succumbed to the reality of his hearing loss and got hearing aids. I understood what he meant – he was amazed at how clearly he could hear. I’m not sure what degree of hearing loss Alex has or what he

Until humans can grow another set of lips at the back of their heads, you need to face me when you talk to me. I’m always one dead battery away from hysterics. No number of fresh batteries will make a hearing aid work, if its wax guard is filled to overflowing, We can lipread only when your lips actually move

As we crawl our way through this global pandemic, I understand the need for masks. But that doesn’t mean I have to like them.  People with hearing loss are not good at masked communication because it cuts off the vital information we get from lipreading. Before the pandemic, my suffering was limited to trying to understand a mask-wearing aesthetician giving

 “Socially distant and Spiritually Connected.” I heard this attributed to Andrew Cuomo, the Governor of New York State whom I’ve decided will be my husband in my next life, but it doesn’t matter who said it first. They are words to accept, right now, to help us through this nightmare of a global pandemic and our necessary physical isolation from

Editor’s Note: HoH is short for hard of hearing, but is increasingly understood to be a person with hearing loss who uses residual hearing, speech and technology to communicate.   So, fellow HoHs – what are you going to do today? Tomorrow? Every day, all day, until this global pandemic is a thing of the past? Besides not hear very

As I write this from the patio of our sunny Palm Springs AirBnB, the news is gloomy – coronavirus panic is creating stock market chaos which screams of economic doom because the world is cancelling any get-together larger than two people or using any mode of transport beyond your two legs or a bicycle. GAHH! And hidden in all this

Yesterday, on a FaceBook group devoted to Tinnitus, I read a heartbreaking post: “My tinnitus is really really bad. I’m leaving this world.” My eyes immediately jumped to see how many comments were made in response and felt relieved. 147! I scanned through some of then: “Hang in there, bro!” “It will get better.” “Get help. Cal your doctor now.”