It's been two weeks since activation and boy what a journey it has been already.
I wrote a blog last week with very mixed and confused feelings. When I write blog posts I usually feel better, but when I wrote the last one I didn't get that feeling. I just felt lost in it all, wondering if it ever got better. Having a pretty horrible cold and cough keeping me up all night as well as trying to jump back into the usual work routine, waking up at 5.45am, driving nearly 2 hours to get to work, long days and then driving nearly two hours home again just to eat and drag myself into bed, it just didn't help.
But now, it's different. I feel different.My cold is pretty much gone, I'm no longer coughing and I wake up in the morning and look forward to putting my processor on. I actually don't like the silence anymore. When I put the processor on, it makes me smile to hear the creaking of floorboards, the clattering of my makeup bits and pieces as I struggle every morning to find the same things I always use. The eyeliner, the concealer, the mascara and mostly importantly the Vaseline (boy, your lips get dry in the winter). The sound of the lids opening and closing whilst in the background the general hum of household noises. I don't know what all the sounds are yet, and some I just make huge assumptions. In the bathroom I often hear a high pitched noise, I assumed it was someone's phone ringing, but perhaps it's a bird. It's amazing just how loud you are in the morning, even when its 5.45am and you're desperately trying not to wake everyone up. One of the loudest things I've found is my own breathing. That early morning sigh when you're staring at the one you love tucked up in bed and eternally you're screaming with jealousy. Why couldn't it be me with the duvet pulled up to my neck dreaming sweet dreams.. surely it would be OK for another hour or two..?
Two days ago I had my third mapping and rehab sessions. Given that I am an adult it is a lot easier for me to express what I can and cannot hear. For this reason hearing tests can be played WHIILST the Audiologist continues to adjust pitches and frequencies and moves those arrows up and down the screen. My Audiogram now looks like a line across the 40-30, more than a hearing aid could ever give me. Afterwards I met with the Rehabilitation team where we played listening games, typically I wasn't allowed to lipread. Given visual clues and context, I could pick out some of the words they said. It's a good start but that internal nagging feeling of wanting to be independent picked away at me afterwards. How long is this going to take? Realistically? We were talking about things that I was given huge clues to, in the real world, how long until I could eavesdrop a random conversation?
It takes time though, and look how far I've come. Two weeks ago I wondered why I had done this, everyone sounded like robots, everything sounded the same and I felt like I'd taken 10 steps backwards. But now, sounds have settled down, there is no more beeping or robotic sounds, I can hear differences in environmental sounds and I know when people are speaking. I'm at the cusp of a breakthrough, it's coming at me hard and fast now and I'm learning more everyday.
And after a long day of listening, there is nothing better than taking the processor off. Bliss.
