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Cochlear Implant Story Part 2
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Cochlear Implant Story Part 2 |
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Jaime Fradera Senior Member
since 2000-11-25
Posts 843Where no tyranny is tolerable |
Part 2. Now the illness began to rage out of control. My bouts of total deafness grew longer, sometimes lasting for days, weeks or even months at a time. I was constantly dizzy, often nauseous, and sometimes disoriented. and my ears roared and rang incessantly. As the episodes of deafness grew more frequent and severe, I could barely communicate with anyone since nobody else knew Braille. I was reduced to sleeping, eating, and passing the time by reading the same Braille magazines over and over. I tried to listen to radio, but the oldies I so loved now sounded hideous and horrible. I felt at times almost as if there was a tightening band or fog pressing in on my ears and temples, as if my head or ears were full and painfully about to burst. I knew a terrible, soul-destroying desperation, like a caged animal, and wanted to wrench or claw or tear at this thing that seemed always to be clinging to me, squeezing on me, and I knew intuitively that while I sat at home eating and sleeping, my hearing was being systematically destroyed. It took two years to get out of there. Exposed to new philosophy, I began to undergo a major psycho spiritual transformation, and my expectations of what was possible began to rise. I went back to college even though by then I had lost all function in the left ear and most hearing on the right. In 1987 my ENT doctor operated on the left ear, inserting a shunt to reduce the fluid pressure in the cochlea, and soon my symptoms diminished. and the damage was finally stopped. Meanwhile, in the early eighties, cochlear implants became available to the public. This was often dramatized by sensational media stories about the miraculous technology that would change the world of the deaf, along with how some deaf people thought it was terrible and was going to destroy deaf culture. I can’t count the number of times somebody would come up to me raving about what they had seen on television or in the paper about this wonderful device, and when was I going to get one? The technology was still in its infancy. There were numerous problems, including rejection and unwanted bone growth which had to be resolved, and only a few people were candidates for implantation; but the last surgery had been such a bad experience and I really didn’t want to have another. These were some of the same characters who pestered me about getting a dog, instead of getting a woman, and I reminded one of them there are things you just can’t be doing with a dog. And so the eighties past, and the nineties came and went, and great strides were made in implant technology. Despite my misgivings about more surgery, When yet another audiology person bugged me about implants, I decided to take a look. An implant fitting begins with a formal clinical evaluation to help determine whether a person may benefit from an implant. A diagnosis of sensory-neural deafness must first be established. Tests are performed to determine the degree of hearing loss in both ears and to what degree hearing-aids may help. When small children are implanted, the evaluation team may include caregivers, a psychologist, speech therapist, or other specialists who work with a child. My speech comprehension was tested both with and without using an FM System and the test scores qualified either ear for implantation. Virginia (my clinician) and I talked about appropriate expectations and gradually the hype and wishful thinking was separated from the truth. This was not easy. For one thing, I was worried that the possibility of “hearing again” (that is, listening to reruns of The Jetsons and throwing rocks at cars) might be so seductive that I could unconsciously be setting myself up for disappointment. In addition, the hucksters of sophisticated technology understandably boast about how their equipment is the latest, fastest, cutting edge and most powerful product on the market today and is the greatest thing since sliced bread. Continue Jaime Country music song title: I Got Tears In My Ears From Lyin On My Back Cryin Over You. |
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Midnitesun
since 2001-05-18
Posts 28647Gaia |
I like the way you interjected a bit of humor into this one, Jaime. It helps the reader relax a bit, and allows them (us) to move to the next level with you. I'm looking forward to the third installment. |
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