Today is two weeks since switch-on. It feels like a month, but at the same time it feels like no time at all. The paradox of time that I'm sure you'll all recognise.
Voices seem to be sounding increasingly like voices to me, which is encouraging. The voices still sound very distant and unclear, and with a limited variety of tones, much as I imagine a hearing person would hear a voice through a thick wall of glass, or a fire door. I'm noticing various "shush-y" sounds and breathy sounds, presumably as I'm beginning to hear some more high pitched frequencies. Paragraph tracking is getting easier, and now I'm starting to listen for specific sounds, like "s", "ch", "sh" as I read - seeing the word on the page helps me know what I'm listening for (more subconsciously than consciously), which is the point of the exercise - helping my brain hear and identify different speech sounds.
I tried my SLT homework last night with Stuart, seeing if I could identify which word he was saying, from mat/mash and mat/mass. I was a bit frustrated as I'd hoped I'd be able to do it better than I had with the SLT last Friday, since voices in general have sounded a bit better since then, but I was at a similar level. Mash I can identify from Mat after a few tries because the end of the word drags on longer, not cut off suddenly, as the explosive "t" sound is. However, Mat and Mass are much harder to differentiate, even after several repetitions. I keep listening for that "s" sound at the end, that comes like an echo, but sometimes it's so soft I miss it. I need to keep practicing.
Once or twice I've understood C's answer to a simple question when he was facing away from me, simply by listening to the rhythm of his answer. Eg. I asked him if he was going to walk upstairs to bed, or if he wanted me to carry him. "Carry me" was clearly differentiated from "walk", because of the number of syllables, and because I knew how he was likely to answer my question. A yes/no question and answer wouldn't have been identified without lipreading, however.
Aside from voices, I'm finding that sounds are still very different from before. Much of the time I live in a very silent world, with some noises coming through from things close to me, like the latch clicking as I shut the door, or the zzzz as I unzip R's school bag when we get home, but noises further away I just don't pick up, unless they are very loud. I'm particularly aware of this when I'm outside, as I don't hear sounds, or if I do, I can't identify them, which makes me feel more vulnerable. I'm just about registering that a child is calling me from the next room, but only if I'm listening for it, and they are calling pretty loudly. Previously I would have noticed those noises more readily. So there's lots of new noises I'm hearing for the first time, but there's other noises I'm used to hearing, like the children talking in the next room (not to understand, but just to be aware that they are there and talking) that I'm just missing completely right now.
At church on Sunday it was interesting to listen to the worship band, as for the first time I was very aware of when the drummer came in - I'd be trying to pick out the singer's rhythm (doing a bit of paragraph tracking practice, matching up what rhythm/pattern I could hear, with the words on the screen!) and not doing very well, and then suddenly "boump, boump, boump" in came the drums and my eyes would be jumping, and paragraph tracking suddenly got complicated! In some ways it was easier because I now clearly knew what the rhythm was, but it got harder because I had to squint to keep my eyes still enough to focus on the words on the screen! I've never noticed the drums that much before. The drums also somehow sounded quite tuneful to me, like a repeated tone, rather than just bash crash bash. As the service went on, it did get easier. Either the drummer read my mind, or my brain just adapted pretty amazingly fast, and my eyes just didn't jump so much. And the songs were all pretty familiar ones (they aren't always) so that helped a lot with the whole paragraph tracking business. I found that listening to the speaker (Stuart was preaching!) was unexpectedly different - I seemed to hear his voice as loudly as if he was standing right in front of me, not 15 feet away. I'm not sure whether this is because the CI picks up distant sounds better than a hearing aid (but if so, why do I seem to live in such a silent world at the moment?) or if it's because I was sitting in a sweet spot near a loudspeaker. Time will show, I guess.
I am hearing continuous sounds more now. This afternoon I spent some time by the side of a busy road, waiting for the boys to complete negotiations over their mode of transport home from school (buggy vs scooter). I realised I could hear the steady "swooosh" of cars constantly passing; it didn't seem that loud to me - but the boys voices certainly sounded quieter and I strained to hear them. (The audiologist said the CI processor has algorithms that reduce noises perceived to be background noises - I certainly noticed that with the lawnmower the other day - as I started it up, there was about a second of hearing the roar as it ramped up, before it was distinctly muted, presumably by the CI algorithm.) Even with hearing aids I have always breathed a sigh of relief on the homeward bound school run as we got off the main road onto our quiet cul-de-sac and everyone's voices sounded louder again, and it seems that is likely to continue with the CI.
Modulating my own voice is an ongoing learning journey. Particularly in a quiet room, I will speak too loudly, as I'm automatically speaking loud enough so I can hear the sound of my own voice, at the same level that I'm used to hearing it with hearing aids. But that's too loud for the situation I'm in. Fortunately most of the quiet situations I'm in at the moment are in the privacy of my own home, and the only awkwardness that arises is from Stuart's concern that I might wake the boys up!
As a follow up to the last post - a few people have asked if my processor has been OK since its dive into the bath. It has been fine. In fact, after speaking to a friend whose daughter has CIs, I discovered that hers is waterproof for up to half an hour! So I went and dug out the tome that is my manual, and found this information...
Not that I plan on testing the IP rating again anytime soon.
Voices seem to be sounding increasingly like voices to me, which is encouraging. The voices still sound very distant and unclear, and with a limited variety of tones, much as I imagine a hearing person would hear a voice through a thick wall of glass, or a fire door. I'm noticing various "shush-y" sounds and breathy sounds, presumably as I'm beginning to hear some more high pitched frequencies. Paragraph tracking is getting easier, and now I'm starting to listen for specific sounds, like "s", "ch", "sh" as I read - seeing the word on the page helps me know what I'm listening for (more subconsciously than consciously), which is the point of the exercise - helping my brain hear and identify different speech sounds.
Once or twice I've understood C's answer to a simple question when he was facing away from me, simply by listening to the rhythm of his answer. Eg. I asked him if he was going to walk upstairs to bed, or if he wanted me to carry him. "Carry me" was clearly differentiated from "walk", because of the number of syllables, and because I knew how he was likely to answer my question. A yes/no question and answer wouldn't have been identified without lipreading, however.
Aside from voices, I'm finding that sounds are still very different from before. Much of the time I live in a very silent world, with some noises coming through from things close to me, like the latch clicking as I shut the door, or the zzzz as I unzip R's school bag when we get home, but noises further away I just don't pick up, unless they are very loud. I'm particularly aware of this when I'm outside, as I don't hear sounds, or if I do, I can't identify them, which makes me feel more vulnerable. I'm just about registering that a child is calling me from the next room, but only if I'm listening for it, and they are calling pretty loudly. Previously I would have noticed those noises more readily. So there's lots of new noises I'm hearing for the first time, but there's other noises I'm used to hearing, like the children talking in the next room (not to understand, but just to be aware that they are there and talking) that I'm just missing completely right now.
At church on Sunday it was interesting to listen to the worship band, as for the first time I was very aware of when the drummer came in - I'd be trying to pick out the singer's rhythm (doing a bit of paragraph tracking practice, matching up what rhythm/pattern I could hear, with the words on the screen!) and not doing very well, and then suddenly "boump, boump, boump" in came the drums and my eyes would be jumping, and paragraph tracking suddenly got complicated! In some ways it was easier because I now clearly knew what the rhythm was, but it got harder because I had to squint to keep my eyes still enough to focus on the words on the screen! I've never noticed the drums that much before. The drums also somehow sounded quite tuneful to me, like a repeated tone, rather than just bash crash bash. As the service went on, it did get easier. Either the drummer read my mind, or my brain just adapted pretty amazingly fast, and my eyes just didn't jump so much. And the songs were all pretty familiar ones (they aren't always) so that helped a lot with the whole paragraph tracking business. I found that listening to the speaker (Stuart was preaching!) was unexpectedly different - I seemed to hear his voice as loudly as if he was standing right in front of me, not 15 feet away. I'm not sure whether this is because the CI picks up distant sounds better than a hearing aid (but if so, why do I seem to live in such a silent world at the moment?) or if it's because I was sitting in a sweet spot near a loudspeaker. Time will show, I guess.
I am hearing continuous sounds more now. This afternoon I spent some time by the side of a busy road, waiting for the boys to complete negotiations over their mode of transport home from school (buggy vs scooter). I realised I could hear the steady "swooosh" of cars constantly passing; it didn't seem that loud to me - but the boys voices certainly sounded quieter and I strained to hear them. (The audiologist said the CI processor has algorithms that reduce noises perceived to be background noises - I certainly noticed that with the lawnmower the other day - as I started it up, there was about a second of hearing the roar as it ramped up, before it was distinctly muted, presumably by the CI algorithm.) Even with hearing aids I have always breathed a sigh of relief on the homeward bound school run as we got off the main road onto our quiet cul-de-sac and everyone's voices sounded louder again, and it seems that is likely to continue with the CI.
Modulating my own voice is an ongoing learning journey. Particularly in a quiet room, I will speak too loudly, as I'm automatically speaking loud enough so I can hear the sound of my own voice, at the same level that I'm used to hearing it with hearing aids. But that's too loud for the situation I'm in. Fortunately most of the quiet situations I'm in at the moment are in the privacy of my own home, and the only awkwardness that arises is from Stuart's concern that I might wake the boys up!
As a follow up to the last post - a few people have asked if my processor has been OK since its dive into the bath. It has been fine. In fact, after speaking to a friend whose daughter has CIs, I discovered that hers is waterproof for up to half an hour! So I went and dug out the tome that is my manual, and found this information...
 |
| Translation: I could have left the processor in the bath for another 29 minutes and 57 seconds, and it would have been OK... |
Not that I plan on testing the IP rating again anytime soon.
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