In response to Julie's posts about telecoils and neckloops: I continue to believe that we all need a handbook to help us learn all the various ways to enhance the work our aids do! Even those of us who are somewhat able to deal with tech issues are overwhelmed with all the tech stuff surrounding hearing! For me, it's even worse due to the fact that I live in a beautiful spruce forest...that has absolutely no, none, not any, cell reception! People who sell cell phones, tablets, etc. apparently cannot even imagine such a situation, so they are clueless about answering questions.

After three days of no phone, internet, or e-mail--but, ugh, TV, we finally got a new modem from Charter/Spectrum and, after five hours driving out to get instructions via cell phone, then driving back to try the suggested fixes, then driving out again and waiting up to an hour each time for a live person, we now have service restored. I did ask the last tech about our lack of cell service using our modem's WiFi (which is supposed to work). He admitted that he lives where there's poor reception and often cannot use his cell phone (either personal or provided by the company) at his house or at many of the places he goes to restore service! Even though we have no cell service here, Charter kept sending texts to my cell phone...and couldn't understand why I didn't respond.

In this rural area, I've yet to find a single meeting room that's looped, so I've never had that experience. Shoot, it's hard to find meeting rooms that offer WiFi, to the point that I've almost given up on Live Transcribe, which requires functioning WiFi. I need to learn about neckloops, esp. when Julie mentions using them with FM or infared (which I'm totally clueless about). Fortunately, the woman who helps me with my aid at Costco is very knowledgeable and helpful, so, now that things are not quite so closed down perhaps I'll be able to schedule an appt. with her to learn more.

The really good news for me is that, after a year of being basically deaf, I've managed to shove the Meniere's Monster back into the closet: I finally found a local doc willing to prescribe adequate hormones for someone my age and am now almost six weeks into living without constant vertigo!!!!! The fact that my hearing is almost as good as it was before Meniere's went bilateral a year ago is a totally unexpected bonus, and I'm thankful every day. The distortion and recruitment are gone as well, so I can actually use the phone again. Freedom! I'm still learning to move around with almost no balance function on my formerly good side and have just begun vestibular rehab--I have some residual balance function on both sides, so it's very hopeful that I'll be able to regain stability through daily vestibular exercises. Even though I can now hear (not well, but enough to get by), I need to use this time to learn more about hearing better.