Music to My Ears
When you lose your vision, you lose contact with things. When you lose your hearing, you lose contact with people.
~Helen Keller
While the idea of losing vision is very scary, more and more I feel the isolation of hearing loss. I try to be brave and own it. I am secretary at a meeting and I realized last night that I was asked a question by someone sitting at the table and was completely unaware that anyone had spoken. A gal next to me prodded me and I responded but it was awkward. Those are the kind of things that ebb at my confidence and make me doubt my place or ability. I am choosing to move forward with this position regardless. I am trying to love myself even with my defective hearing. I suppose they will tell me if it gets to be a problem. I feel the more I give into those belittling inner messages, the more I give up on parts of my life that I enjoy.
And Beethoven spoke to his brothers of his pain in a letter called The Heiligenstadt Testament:
Speech is civilization itself. The word, even the most contradictory word, preserves contact---it is silence which isolates.
~Thomas Mann
Beethoven started to go deaf at the age of 25. According to California Symphony Music Director Donato Cabrera:
Once his hearing was fully gone by age 45, Beethoven lost his public life with it. Giving up performing and public appearances, he allowed only select friends to visit him, communicating through written conversations in notebooks. His deafness forced him to become a very private, insular person over the course of time.
And Beethoven spoke to his brothers of his pain in a letter called The Heiligenstadt Testament:
Alas, how could I proclaim the deficiency of a sense which ought to have been more perfect with me than with other me. A sense which I once possessed in the highest perfection, to an extent indeed that few of my profession ever enjoyed. Alas, I cannot do this. Forgive me therefore, when you see me withdraw from you, with whom I would so gladly mingle.
~L van Beethoven
DO NOT GIVE IN! have you had a hearing test lately? could be a wax buildup also.
ReplyDeleteIt's nice to have encouragement from a true fighter!
DeletePlease don't give in. Have your hearing tested, look into hearing aids if need be.
ReplyDeleteHearing aids have been in place for years. So grateful for those, as the world would be almost completely silent without.
DeleteI realise now how insensitive my comment was. I didn't realise you already have hearing aids.
DeleteFor what it's worth: when I was first diagnosed with my shitty disease, hearing loss and possibly blindness was on the cards. It rarely happens in combination but even the faintest of possibilities threw me into a deep hole. Hearing loss is more common but it has not (yet) happened. Instead I have an entire symphony of ear noises from the lowest rumble to the highest pitch. Sometimes I still long for silence. But I got used to it. Mostly.
After my initial diagnosis I spent four weeks in a specialist clinic for rare hearing disorders (due to anything) and met amazing doctors and experts who among other therapies fitted and tested a variety of state of the art hearing aids. I remember one woman who lost her hearing in one ear due to a tumor while her hearing in the other ear was considerably impaired also. She was fitted with a tiny set of blue tooth loudspeakers that transmitted sound from the still somewhat hearing ear to the other. Another patient, a taxi driver, who lost his hearing after a car crash was training to talk and hear with cochlea implants. And so on.
One of my nieces is married to an engineer working with Siemens developing a new generation of hearing aids that are currently tested.
What I am trying to tell you: please don't give up.
Beethoven was a grumpy man who treated women like shit and that long before he lost his hearing. Although some researchers now claim he "only" suffered from tinitus.
I should explain that I was in that clinic because while my hearing is not affected, my balance organs are which means that I (too) often suffer from vertigo.
DeleteNot at all insensitive. Sabine I haven’t heard silence in 2 decades. At first I never thought I would never get used to it and I would be dramatic and cry but then I realized the crying increased the tinnitus. Shit, can’t even have a good cry. For the most part, I’ve learned to tolerate the noise. I had deafness with only sporadic episodes of short term vertigo. Being that I’ve experienced both, I know your lot is heavier than mine. Vertigo is a real bitch.
DeleteI don't know if you have hearing aids but try them. My hearing is going too and I've been promising myself for the past 18 months to get a hearing test.
ReplyDeleteDeafness is not easy but I know deaf people who lead wonderful, full lives. You and your partner could learn sing language; it is truly a beautiful language. Sometimes I dream is sign and it makes me feel so good.
That sounds lovely! I have had the hearing aids for about 20 years now but as the hearing worsens, they can only do so much.
DeleteFight on, Linda, fight on!
ReplyDelete💜💜
DeleteIt must be scary not to have heard the question at the meeting. As Debra said, “Fight on.”
ReplyDeleteFight on! You have a rooting section here who loves fighters.
ReplyDeleteYou make me smile Bill. I not ready to give up. They’ll have to push me out of the secretary’s chair.
DeleteThis is a beautiful post, Linda. And I so admire you -- keep it up! And never be hesitant to tell people you're having trouble with your hearing. They will be far kinder and understand if you have to ask "what?" again. I know this. But yes, scary indeed. Any major change like this is. But you will handle whatever is in front of you. Look what you have done with your life so far?
ReplyDelete