The silence I encounter when removing my hearing aids at night

I sleep with one HA if I am home alone. But I have to hope that that ear is not stuck in my pillow if I need to hear the smoke alarm or the phone!!

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Thank you, for your comments @susanmarylynn… 'Tis a long time since I actually lived in Shetland, but I never lost my love for those Islands, especially the inhabitants, a wonderfully hardy breed, and a more friendly folk, I have yet to encounter! I left Shetland some 27 or so years ago, but I go back and visit as often as I can. My Shetland days were my first encounter with analogue hearing aids, they amplified absolutely everything, Shetland NHS Health Board were absolutely wonderful back then, they would fly me to Aberdeen “free gratis”, as many times as I needed to visit the Audiologists down there… Nowadays, I have Phonak Naida Paradise 90 BTE with the 675 batteries, before that I had the none rechargeable Marvels with 105db RIC’s, I dabble a bit in DIY self-programming, and buy my aids privately… I live slightly out in the Boonies, in the Scottish Highlands, I prefer it that way, big towns and cities have their merits, but they are not for me. You don’t have to sleep with hearing aid in, there are loads of environmental equipment out there for HOH folks or indeed big D, a pad that goes under your pillow, and vibrates, flashes, and it would waken the dead, it is extremely loud, hooks up to your alarm clock, phone, doorbell, smoke alarm, baby alarms, whatever… There are many types of environmental aids, 14 or so years ago, I installed this type of equipment for a living, with Deaf Services, I should imagine a lot of these types of equipment will have advanced greatly in that time? In all truth I am needing an implant like yourself, but due to NHS financial constraints, I am unlikely to get one… I hope all continues to go well with your implant. Cheers Kev :wink:

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Our health care has changed. I live in Toronto; when I came here about 20 years ago I couldn’t find a family doctor. Guvmint wants to pattern our health care after US care. Rant’s over. I guess we have some health care…I can get an MRI if i really need it. Just takes about 3 months…unless you’re famous.

DaveL

I do NOT enjoy taking mine out. I feel like someone stuffed cotton in my ears. All the detail from sounds just disappears. It’s like listening to Monk & Coltrane on a CD and then switching to AM radio.

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I agree with what bluejay says but I’m sure a lot of people would think that I was being rude or inconsiderate. One thing for sure is the silence I encounter at night makes it easy to fall asleep. I then depend on my wife to wake me in an emergency. Of course first I have to figure out what she’s saying

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I’m afraid you’re correct, @hass5744. Because sounds, not speech, are paramount in my world it is a blessed relief when I can hand over the listening chores to MrsSpudGunner at bedtime and unwind.

Mind you, I still have enough hearing left to detect the big goings on, but I can relax more fully without my aids.

[… but I still must remain attuned to the sounds emanating from HerSelf®️]

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I’m not sure I would hear a nuclear bomb going off by in my backyard. But then again I probably wouldn’t need to

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I second that!! It’s a blessing to have someone who understands too.

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I remember getting my first aids and walking the dog and wondering what the strange squeaking sound I was hearing, then I realized it was birds chirping in the trees above.
My relative has worse hearing than I and his wife said the fire alarm went off one night and he slept right through it

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my last hearing aids deteriorated with every visit to the audiologist that sold them to me. I had severe wind noise. Walks were a chore. I couldn’t hear cars behind me either. And our streets have no sidewalks. (still an issue with my new hearing aids. Paradise.)

Now with my new hearing aids I hear the wind in the trees! The little birds chirping! It’s beautiful. I used to love hearing acoustic guitars well played. I stopped listening to beautiful music. I’m looking forward to listening again.
Dave

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Walking my dog is beautiful. However, I sometimes wonder about getting a hearing dog. Or giving my dog specific training. She is wonderful and very smart. She walks me quickly across streets at intersections to keep me out of harms way.
I wish she was responsive to cars behind on streets with no sidewalks. (Tesla driver goes down the middle of the road at high speed. I stepped the wrong way one day because I didn’t know she was behind. Car stopped. Close call. She was very angry.)

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A Hearing Ear Dog. I want one. Wishing my dog could stop me from one of my stupid off-topic replies because of mis-hearing the conversation

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I never thought my hearing was bad. Somehow I convinced myself that all the speakers in modern electronics produced poor audio, that my neighborhood had very few birds due to recent overdevelopment (even though it was fully developed 60 years ago), and that lots more people mumbled for mysterious reasons. My wife had enough and made me get checked out and … well long story short I have a pair of KS10s.

The first time I put them in I heard a lot of stuff but that didn’t bowl me over. I just thought ‘well sure, everythings a bit louder but that’s not that special’. It was when I took them out and half of all that was going on around me just disappeared and the rest sounded like I was listening to it through a pillow. That was a real ah-hah moment.

I’ve had them now for six weeks I think and even now sometimes I go into the app and push the mute button so I can get a real A/B comparison in a specific place. It’s striking. I’m glad my wife called me on my denial BS and made me get checked out. Life changing.

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My tinnitus sounds a bit like a jazz band, just not a very creative one.

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When I first got my aids the Audi told me to wear them all day every day to get used to them
So when I left him I got on a bus wearing my aids. I was actually startled at all the sounds. I spent some time figuring out where they were coming from. Fare box, windows rattling, bus frame rattling and flexing and so on
I soon realized that some things are worth missing. I never wear them on the bus or train. :slight_smile:

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Wow there’s actually someone else who has this on the forum, I have a very mild form of this type, it’s called musical ear or Musical hallucination (MH) for me it’s a orchestra! Oddly I don’t get this all the time tho, as it can and does change to other sounds at times, I think I’m lucky in a way because I actually have to concentrate to actually notice it.

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I have 2 jazz bands. Both are out of tune. Focus on one, the other sounds so much more noticeable and so much worse. It’s like every musician is tuning their instrument as loud as they can. A concophonyb.
And they play loud. So anyone talking more quietly I can’t hear. Adding white noise won’t help. It willl be noise still.

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I feel the same way as you,I don’t like the feeling at all,in fact it seem a little scary to me,like is my hearing getting worse!

Getting new aids and then being told to wear them as much as possible right from the start might not have been the best idea. You’ll be overwhelmed by all the new sounds like you were on the bus. Your brain needs time to adjust which it will and then you would return to your audiologist for further adjustments to the aids. To tell a person to wear the aids as much as possible right from the get go leads to people not wearing the aids at all. Nobody wants everything to be screaming in their face 24/7

Usually an audi/fitter won’t put a new wearer immediately at full prescription strength, but work up to that over the first several visits (took maybe 6 weeks for me initially). If it’s too much, you need to tell the audi to back off some so you can get to full strength more slowly. That should help the overwhelm, and def wearing all day makes a big diff in getting used to the sounds you’re not used to hearing

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