I experienced a lot of the above, not anger particularly, more resignation, and I don’t think depression, maybe because I’m an introverted sort to start with and never enjoyed a lot of social butterfly stuff, so I didn’t miss it.
That graphic ought to include embarrassment, though. That’s how I felt when in a dog training class I had to keep asking the person next to me, “What are we supposed to be doing now?” When I went to lunch with a friend and the waiter spouted off the specials, I’d have to have my friend interpret. I resigned from my dog club’s board of directors because they kept having board meetings via telephone conference, and I couldn’t understand most of what was happening. I gave up tv, not that I was a heavy watcher to start with, and just didn’t try to take part in group discussions when I was out and about.
In my case I knew and accepted I needed aids, and wished I could afford them. Cost was the barrier - and I didn’t even know how high cost often is. My father’s hearing deteriorated as he aged, and it always annoyed me that he insisted “his kind” of loss couldn’t be helped with aids (without trying them). Cost would not have been a barrier for him. Pride was. He could get nasty with anyone who hinted age affected him in any way.
So I dealt as best I could, and when I finally couldn’t stand it any longer and went to investigate aids, my first misplaced attempt was with a provider who fit me with $7,000 aids, not mentioning price until I asked - which was in part my fault for not asking up front, but I had $3,000-$3,500 in mind as the price of hearing aids at that time and finally felt in a position to squeeze that much out of the budget. Yeek! I about ripped them out of my ears. Got talked into trying them for 2 weeks anyway, found they didn’t help that much - which I now realize had to do with fit, not brand - and abandoned the whole idea.
Mentioning the whole, please speak loud because … to my regular doctor, he told me to go to Costco. Said of his patients who needed aids, the ones who went to Costco were the most satisfied, so off I went.
Not all of the changes the degraded hearing caused just reversed. I still watch a lot less tv than ever, still don’t dive into group situations. I’d already abandoned my landline phone after trying supposed hearing boosted phones, etc. At least I could hear some people on my cell. First the Rexton Trax 42s and now even more the KS9s are great improvements in that regard, but I no longer automatically answer the phone unless I know it’s someone I want to talk to. If someone leaves a ratt-a-tat–tat voice mail I can’t understand, I shrug it off instead of worrying about it. Those kind are almost always sales anyway.
So the hearing loss changed me, and the aids mitigated or reversed some but not all of the changes.
