No one likes to repeat themselves, apparently

Oh my - the "nevermind" just frustrates me so...feel so diminished. One of my daughters does it all the time, yet gets annoyed when I bluff - can't have it both ways!

This just goes to show how different we all are. I am always going to push the telecoil options I guess. I used a Phonak hand held mike years ago that helped me a lot. It was way before the Roger Pen device. I think I went through 3 of them before Phonak upgraded everything to BlueTooth with the Roger device.

I was teaching K - 9 physical education and health then so had to hear a lot of 'little' voices, along with some big ones. That earlier device made it possible for me to remain in the workplace. Those earlier devices were wireless, but depended on the telecoil. The t-coil eliminates background noise. As with all microphone devices, the closer it gets to the desired sound, the better it will transmit. You cannot just put it on the center of a table full of people and expect to hear.

Along came Roger Pen. My evaluation of it was it's 'just OK'. It was way to complex for a lot of people to use. The older device was basic and simple. I do think that new innovations are good, but sometimes they are too complicated to operate correctly for those of us who are not under age 45.

I just upgraded my iPhone from a 6 to a 12mini. I've had it for a month and am still trying to figure it out. Even with help from a Verizon salesperson who was willing to take a lot of time with me, I remain still mystified about some of the things I want and need this phone to do. The old one worked perfectly. I miss it. All this hearing technology is a lot like that.

I keep going back to the telecoil with a neckloop for my cell phone, my computer, my portable radio, etc. because it's easy to use. I've been part of the advocacy effort in our locale to get hearing loops installed. We have them in the performing arts center, and in hundreds of other locations. People say they don't have loops in their locale. The reason is that the people in their region have not done the education and advocacy to get them installed.

If we who are hard of hearing don't get involved in effecting change, who else is going to do it? Our disability is invisible, and it's discounted as a 'minor inconvenience' by people who don't understand what HL does to a person. It just has two Es between the H and the L. 🙂 We know that, but others don't. Sorry for the rant.

@shirla

My daughter does the same thing. Everyone I talk to who has a hearing loss says that is their number one peeve. I don’t let it go.
Family members sometimes get more impatient than friends or acquaintances . My daughter does have an impatient streak in her…always has but I still don’t let it slide. It is dismissive and “hearies” don’t understand for the most part. I can be impatient too….she said with a big smile.

FL Mary

@julieo

I use it for gps when I am unfamiliar with the route…don’t always understand the words but the vocal prompts help when looking at the directions….I can almost hear them correctly. And also plug it in into my phone for music. I also have a small mic attached to my main tv and have tethered myself to it when I wanted to hear either a musical or the 3 tenors singing for example.

Not used a lot but it works when I do….I can use it with the phone but rely on Innocaption and that voice is enough for me.

FL Mary

2 am and cant sleep so was reading a few comments and this one caught my attention as i probably have not had one full night sleep in 2 years.. i am woken by a "machinery" noise which you say you hear, and cant get back to sleep. I have moderate hearing loss but do not use hearing aids as retired and can turn up tv etc., and rarely go out. I have tinnitus and a lot of pain and pressure in my ears but at 77 ent who is not very nice to me said fifty per cent of those who get tubes in ears get infection! but its the "pressure" hurts the most and I do the thing holding my nose and blowing.
So I hear a noise and go downstairs, cant hear the fridge running, either in kitchen or one in basement standing next to them, but if i put my ear to side of fridge/s they "are" running for over half hour; same with gas fired furnace in basement its under my bedroom.... have lived with furnaces many yeas but last 2 years wakes me up, but after it shuts off i can hear it... its very frustrating..
sometimes things ARE running and sometimes not when I go to check; our neighbour is reasonably close and I wonder if it is the exhaust pipe from his gas fuelled hot water tank or their furnace exhaust or air conditioner; there are five swimming pools above or below ground within 3 blocks of us in summer, which run motors to heat water or stir up chemicals but cant see for the fences and trees...
and in winter several people have hot tubs with heaters running; we live between the Canada pipe line a few blocks away and the City water pump house which pumps water from the lake for 54000 people!
But: I seem to be the only one hearing/feeling the noise/vibration in our family... I am the odd one out. So, am I actually hearing these things or is it a mix with the tinnitus? I think I have hyperacusis, not sure how to spell, I cant hear my husband always when he talks to me six feet away yet when i put down say a plastic jug on my plastic kitchen counter it hurts my ears? I sometimes wonder if I am going mad..and all this seems to be when on hundreds of antibiotics for bowel infection and utis.... ear plugs dont work and dont allow me to listen to you tube tapes to get back to sleep... could be worse but with other medical issues its getting me down emotionally explaining it to myself and others! Thanks for reading. J.

Because our neighbors are deer, elk, and other wildlife, they don't run any machines. The road is far enough away that I can't hear the occasional car, either. But, there's a really big machine in the partial basement under my bedroom, or so it seems. I know that (a) I'm not supposed to wear my hearing aid when I mow or use the chainsaw or other noisy things, and (b) should use earplugs if I can't avoid something noisy...but, I forget, and then I listen to a rerun of the lawnmower or chainsaw or whatever during the night. I believe that many of the non-existent sounds we hear are sounds we actually DID hear once upon a time. I know that hearing the dishwasher run while I'm in my office is acoustic hallucinations, as I haven't actually heard a dishwasher clearly for a long time, unless I'm wearing the aid and standing right next to it. Even then, I don't hear water swishing, just a faint noise...but, sitting in the quiet of my office, I clearly "hear" the dishwasher, just as I was able to hear it years ago. Just as I can't hear whether or not I've started the car, sometimes I could swear the engine is running after I've shut it off.

I also sometimes think I'm hearing something noisy running while I'm in the kitchen, go stand next to the 'fridge to see if it's acting strange. Again, it's all in my head, not real at all.

Another word for hyperacusis is recruitment, where sounds that most people hear without a problem are overly loud: dog barking, for example. Recruitment is one of the "fun" add ons of Meniere's...probably can be associated with other hearing problems as well. After I went bilateral over two years ago, then finally got the hormones I need to cease having crises, not only did hearing in my one ear that can hear a little return, but the godawful recruitment stopped. (It had been so bad that I wasn't able to wear my aid, because loud sounds were very painful.) That was so encouraging that I'm scheduled to have a new hearing test to see if it might be possible now to have an aid for my nearly useless right ear. I've had recruitment in my useless ear for nearly 40 years (I think), and it's bothersome because I've always at least one large dog, if not two or three. My dog understands that I don't hear, so he barks his big bark to let me know that there's someone walking along our road, over 100' from the house. At least now, with adequate hormone replacement, the sound doesn't tear through my head the way it used to.

I would like to move the "machine shop" from under my bedroom, though! My solution for falling asleep is to work hard all day, which is very easy as I'm the person who keeps up our small acreage and very old house.

You are so right about hearing care professionals not informing patients about ALDs. They examine, diagnose, prescribe, fit, and adjust hearing aids. They should also follow up, help with ALDs and aural rehabilitation. But they have to make a profit to stay in business. I think they are pushed to hard by the competitive system in our society.

And patients need to be better informed and more proactive in their own treatment. It isn’t easy. I’m switching over from Oticon to Phonak and there are big differences. I’m an experienced hearing aid user and it is still hard. Lots of new stuff and it works differently.

@julie04 Just my two cents regarding the Roger Pen for those that may not be familiar with it. It's basically a wireless handheld microphone. If you have Phonak hearing aids or Cochlear Americas implant, the audio from the Roger is picked up by the aid/implant. Since I don't have a Phonak hearing aid, I had to purchase the Mylink, which is an accessory for the Roger. The Mylink picked up the Roger signal but you still need to get the signal to your aid/implant. Since my aids have a telecoil, I used that method to hear from the Mylink. You could also use headphones that connect to the Mylink if you don't have a telecoil. I actually thought the original Roger Pen was a bit complicated, only because I didn't think the "automatic" mode worked in all situations. Ideally, you could put the Roger on your table at a restaurant, and it would pick up the voices from your guests at the table. Background noise was too bad so I had to manually set the Roger to directional mode and point it to the person talking. It worked much better. Most people do not always remember how to switch from automatic mode and may even forget that its an option. I haven't tried the newer Roger products to see how they compare.
Tony in Michigan

For some of us, it's far more than simply not hearing: it's hearing that someone is speaking, but not being able to decode what's being said. Some of us have, in addition to low levels of hearing, distortion. That's really hard to explain, especially since it doesn't make good sense to me, the person who has it! Between recruitment and distortion, hearing loss isn't really the problem. Fortunately, both are not as bad as they were before I was able to get on a good hormone replacement program, but they're still present.

I recall the year that Phonak came out with the Roger Pen device. Many people at the HLAA convention in St. Louis were given a free device to take home, demonstrate, and give feedback on. It was an interesting innovative device; still is. One of the crazy things about it is the design to look like a pen. The reason behind that was so people could hand hold it, point it in a speaker's direction and not be obvious that it was a hearing device. (Another one of those 'hide your hearing loss' things.)

Initially, I thought it was a pretty cool device. And, yes, it still is and it has been improved since that introductory product. Still, I personally found that it almost felt 'silly' to use because pointing a pen at someone is almost like shining a flashlight in their face. 🙂 I like having device that I can clip on my shirt, set on the table, clip on another person's shirt, give to a speaker, etc. It's a microphone gosh darn it. Just like other mikes it has to be pointed in the direction where the desired sound is coming from. It can be set on directional, but the longer the distance from the desired sound to the microphone, the more background noise that can sneak into the equation. You have to be willing to tell people what a device is for to get the most benefit from it.