The Results of the ...

...Hearing Test Today.

Speech Recognition:

• Left: 40% (down from 62%)
• Right: 32% (down from 40%)

Audiogram: (tests at 10 frequencies)

• 6 highest frequencies (1500 to 8000): ain't happening. either 100 to 110, which is the same as cannot hear it at all (profoundly deaf here) ** edited to add that out of these 6, I don't register 5 of them at all. **
  
• main speech frequency (750): 70 - border of moderately severe to severe hearing loss - no I'm not ignoring you, I really cannot hear you.
• next higher (1000): 80 to 90 - severe to profound
• two lowest (250 and 500): 20 and 30 - out of normal and well into mild to slight
  

The audiogram part of the show is actually fairly stable. Main is slowly getting more severe and normal isn't normal anymore. It's not good news, but I already knew it was that bad.

The hardest part is the speech recognition. Seven years ago my left ear (good ear) caught up with my right ear in the audiogram. They match each other almost perfectly. Over the past seven years , the only thing that really changes was the two lowest frequencies moving out of normal range.

But my speech recognition in my left ear stayed above 60%. Now it is where my right ear was two years ago. It is a 22% drop in two years.

And it is not something I can get back. And I need it. For the phone, for music, for hearing my kitty babies meow, for hearing my little Cliff the Mutt make his baby alligator noises when he wants dinner, to hear my husband, to do my job, to listen to Scrat Monster yelp at the ball, to hear Oscar the Dog whine when he cannot see me.

Ken and I joke that 50% of how I hear is guess work based on the context of the conversation. Looks like it's actually 60%. I cannot take cold calls. If I don't have some idea of what I will be talking about with someone on the phone I'm lost. Same thing in real life.

Progressive bi-aural sensorineural hearing loss sucks. I'm not nearly as graceful as Alison about it. Like that's a shock to any of you that know both of us. And there is no good reason for the loss, no known genetic markers, nothing they can find. Things like this you want something to blame. Okay, I do, maybe not someone else. Again with the not being graceful.

Call a loved one, call a friend, have your child tell you a story, go to a show, listen to your kitty baby purr, hug your dog till he squeaks. Cherish the fact that you can hear all those things.