Activation!!

contradica

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Here I am!! A fully functional female cyborg! :) Here is the low down!! :D

Jennifer my audi hooked me up to the computer and then told me to get rid of my hearing aid, literally. She had no trouble finding the secret spot where the magnet was. I can hardly feel it! She changed it to a number 2 magnet because of my hair and so far so good. She started the process of activating my brand spanking new Harmony processor with Fidelity 120 with extended lows. Sounds hot right? :) Right off the bat, she starts raising the volume on all 16 electrodes at once until I reached a comfortable level. Jennifer's voice had an echo. I could hear the sounds of her speech but for the life of me I couldn't make out what she said. It sounded terrible :) It sounded like all the munchkins from Oz were rounded up, forced to smoke a joint, and placed in a tin can with helium. I could hear myself but everyone said that I was talking softer then normal. I talk soft to begin with! Jennifer decided to create a second map based on the response from each electrode. The overall volume was louder then the first map. However, the same high as hell munchkins in the tin can breathing helium was there. Jennifer created a third map from the electrical response of the electrodes. It produced the same pot smoking munchkins in a tin can passing around a deflated balloon with helium. All three programs are 50/50 T-Mic and auxiliary microphone.

Since all 16 electrodes were turned on, I have experienced no twitching. That is a plus! I was dropping components and banging on the table to see what kind of noises I could hear. It sounded like dull thuds. Once she unhooked me and I was officially on my own, I heard the sound of speech. I heard my mom zip and unzip her purse. I heard someone talking but nobody in the room was flapping their gums. Turns out it was none other then the good doctor, Dr. Bigelow standing right outside the door. He popped his head in to say hello. Jennifer showed me how to operate my sexy little Harmony processor and all the other gadgets and gizmos that come along with it. She sent me on my merry little way and I will be back to see her next Monday, same time!

I left the office, paid my valet parking fee, and patiently waited outside for my truck to come. I was hearing speech noises coming from all over the place. I did not hear cars. I heard a bus roar on by that sounded semi normal. A fire truck complete with lights and sirens came to visit the front of the building. I could not hear the sirens until the truck was within birds eye view. The next sound I thought I would be able to hear but did not. A HELICOPTER practically landed right on top of my head and I could not hear that! I felt it for sure because this girl got the worst case of wind blown hair. I looked like I came right off a Harley. Yikes! Then Mom and Philly started the third degree about how soft spoken I was. So if I feel like I am screaming, I'm fine.

My truck finally arrives in one piece. I get into the drivers seat, the valet shuts my door, and I nearly jumped out of my stilettos! It scared the hell out of me. It has a different sound then before. My blinker is SOOO loud. No wonder why people hate when I leave it on. :) I am picking up strange sounds and not hearing the obvious. On the ride home, I seem to notice that sounds were getting softer, so I turned up the volume. I started to tell when Philly was talking in the backseat, although I could not make out what she was saying. I decided to turn my hearing aid on for safety reason riding in the car. Philly's voice normalized for a sentence or two. I was taken aback by that. I was able to differentiate when my Mom and Philly talked. ;)

I got home around 7:30, removed my hearing aid, and declared myself exhausted. Thank Aunt Jemimah that I did not have to go back to work because I would have been as useless as teats on a bull. I have already noticed an improvement from when I was first turned on to now. I made myself some soup for dinner and I heard the dial turn on and off the stove. I heard the pot grate against the grill. I started banging my spoon around in my pan. My sexy little Harmony is going crazy when I start typing on my keyboard a mile a minute! I have the TV on but I cannot hear a darn thing. Sitting on my ear here is some crazy technology. Nothing sounds normal and I don't care!! :) I'm not giving up!!! :)

My blog has more detail if you all would like to pay a visit or two. Perhaps drop a comment or three. :giggle:
 
Here I am!! A fully functional female cyborg! :) Here is the low down!! :D

Jennifer my audi hooked me up to the computer and then told me to get rid of my hearing aid, literally. She had no trouble finding the secret spot where the magnet was. I can hardly feel it! She changed it to a number 2 magnet because of my hair and so far so good. She started the process of activating my brand spanking new Harmony processor with Fidelity 120 with extended lows. Sounds hot right? :) Right off the bat, she starts raising the volume on all 16 electrodes at once until I reached a comfortable level. Jennifer's voice had an echo. I could hear the sounds of her speech but for the life of me I couldn't make out what she said. It sounded terrible :) It sounded like all the munchkins from Oz were rounded up, forced to smoke a joint, and placed in a tin can with helium. I could hear myself but everyone said that I was talking softer then normal. I talk soft to begin with! Jennifer decided to create a second map based on the response from each electrode. The overall volume was louder then the first map. However, the same high as hell munchkins in the tin can breathing helium was there. Jennifer created a third map from the electrical response of the electrodes. It produced the same pot smoking munchkins in a tin can passing around a deflated balloon with helium. All three programs are 50/50 T-Mic and auxiliary microphone.

Since all 16 electrodes were turned on, I have experienced no twitching. That is a plus! I was dropping components and banging on the table to see what kind of noises I could hear. It sounded like dull thuds. Once she unhooked me and I was officially on my own, I heard the sound of speech. I heard my mom zip and unzip her purse. I heard someone talking but nobody in the room was flapping their gums. Turns out it was none other then the good doctor, Dr. Bigelow standing right outside the door. He popped his head in to say hello. Jennifer showed me how to operate my sexy little Harmony processor and all the other gadgets and gizmos that come along with it. She sent me on my merry little way and I will be back to see her next Monday, same time!

I left the office, paid my valet parking fee, and patiently waited outside for my truck to come. I was hearing speech noises coming from all over the place. I did not hear cars. I heard a bus roar on by that sounded semi normal. A fire truck complete with lights and sirens came to visit the front of the building. I could not hear the sirens until the truck was within birds eye view. The next sound I thought I would be able to hear but did not. A HELICOPTER practically landed right on top of my head and I could not hear that! I felt it for sure because this girl got the worst case of wind blown hair. I looked like I came right off a Harley. Yikes! Then Mom and Philly started the third degree about how soft spoken I was. So if I feel like I am screaming, I'm fine.

My truck finally arrives in one piece. I get into the drivers seat, the valet shuts my door, and I nearly jumped out of my stilettos! It scared the hell out of me. It has a different sound then before. My blinker is SOOO loud. No wonder why people hate when I leave it on. :) I am picking up strange sounds and not hearing the obvious. On the ride home, I seem to notice that sounds were getting softer, so I turned up the volume. I started to tell when Philly was talking in the backseat, although I could not make out what she was saying. I decided to turn my hearing aid on for safety reason riding in the car. Philly's voice normalized for a sentence or two. I was taken aback by that. I was able to differentiate when my Mom and Philly talked. ;)

I got home around 7:30, removed my hearing aid, and declared myself exhausted. Thank Aunt Jemimah that I did not have to go back to work because I would have been as useless as teats on a bull. I have already noticed an improvement from when I was first turned on to now. I made myself some soup for dinner and I heard the dial turn on and off the stove. I heard the pot grate against the grill. I started banging my spoon around in my pan. My sexy little Harmony is going crazy when I start typing on my keyboard a mile a minute! I have the TV on but I cannot hear a darn thing. Sitting on my ear here is some crazy technology. Nothing sounds normal and I don't care!! :) I'm not giving up!!! :)

My blog has more detail if you all would like to pay a visit or two. Perhaps drop a comment or three. :giggle:

Keep at it and good luck, and keep us posted!
Rick
 
Wow, that's an interesting day that you had and I love how you describe your experience with your hookup...

People sounded mechanical to me my first day... nothing like your stoned munchkins in a helium filled tin can.
 
Wow, what a good activation report and hello sexy Harmony! I'm so glad it went well for you. You are such a good writer and some of things you said made me burst out laughing (the helicopter bit). Don't worry, I couldn't hear cars and lots of other sounds with my first activation - some sounds take a while to fade in and will do so as your brain adapts and increased dynamic range takes effect.

My activation went very well too! I could hear voices right away, which surprised me again as it took an hour or two last time for them to become apparant and this is my least stimulated ear we are talking about. We mapped the new CI first and then tried it together with the first CI switched on. I found that it dominated the first CI, so we had to remap that one as well. It's been 6 months since my last map, so that wasn't really surprising.

I think I've been quite aggressive with the loud tolerance this time around, whereas first time around I took a softly softly because of the memory of recruitment issues. Now, both ears sound balanced but I've got the "oh boy! it's a loud world" feeling LOL! It certainly brings back memories.

So far, I've really noticed the effect of having sound localisation. As I was driving home, I heard a roar and glanced over my right shoulder and it was a United Airlines Boeing 747 sailing past just before touching down at the airport nearby. I also could tell where a police siren was coming from before the squad car came into view too. Interesting. I would have heard those sounds before but not know where they were coming from.

I shamelessly love all the bits and pieces that you get with the CI too, this time apart from the usual accessories to the CI, I got a smart looking backpack, a cap, a little torch and a CD holder. I was carrying so much stuff back to the car today I looked like I had done some serious shopping.

I now feel exactly the same way as you - tired and overwhelmed, which I wasn't expecting as it is a bilateral activation and supposedly it's less dramatic. I decided to come home as the whole session took longer than expected, as we ended up remapping the first one as well.

All in all, I have no regrets. :)
 
Contra ,

Glad the activation went well. I think your description of what things sound like (Pot smoking Munchkins) is the best one so far, LOL. I was also amazed at all the accessories that come with a CI. I looked at the box mine came in and asked my audi "Is that all for one ear?". I was also tired after activation but when I got home I was making running around making all kinds of noise. My dog looked at me like I was nuts!
 
R2D2,

Glad things went well for you. Will you have to leave the older CI off so you can adjust to the new one?
 
WoW! Great activation! It does get better. Enjoy! I love your descriptions. Keep us posted.
 
So far, I've really noticed the effect of having sound localisation. As I was driving home, I heard a roar and glanced over my right shoulder and it was a United Airlines Boeing 747 sailing past just before touching down at the airport nearby. I also could tell where a police siren was coming from before the squad car came into view too. Interesting. I would have heard those sounds before but not know where they were coming from.

R2D2!! That is great that you were able to hear voices and already start localizing sound! That was speedy progress! Does your new ear have a tinny sounds to it? I discovered what you mean by the "Oh boy, its loud!" sound. Paper flipping is driving me nuts today. I had to turn it down and turn my hearing aid back on to give myself some time to recover from it. Does the loudness eventually calm down?

Does your audi have you removing the other implant at all? I'm wearing my hearing aid but it is turned off unless I need to use it. If I turn it on, I'm finding I need to the lower the volume down.

You know I have to say something about the Jet. I am very happy that you were able to tell where it was coming from because I wouldn't have heard it if it landed right on top of me :)

:h5: we activated!! :)
 
LOL - I have the same processor and experienced those minchkin voices also. I had trouble keeping a straight face! :jaw: It eventually came through normally, make sure you use it as much as you can. Good Luck!
 
Don't post much, write like crap and it is hard for me to express myself, very nice to read a post from someone that can.

We are very much in the same boat, me at plus 2 months, learn to love the munchkins for awhile. You will be cranking up the volume every other day and she will reset that your next visit.
As SCBassist said use it as much as you can stand and don't use the aid as much as you can get by with, to force yourself to get all your input from your implant till your brain can learn to deal with both the will finally blend together, just my thought.

The best of luck of course and thanks for the great post.
 
LOL - I have the same processor and experienced those minchkin voices also. I had trouble keeping a straight face! :jaw: It eventually came through normally, make sure you use it as much as you can. Good Luck!

These munchkin voices are very very very funny. I have kept my processor on all day with the exclusion of about an hour where I lowered the volume and turned on my hearing aid because I was getting a headache and I wanted the Tylenol to kick in before I go back to OZ! :)
 
That's great! Good luck with the sounds improving over time. Thanks for sharing your experiences and it helps me to learn more about the use of CIs so I can keep them in mind at work when working with chidlren who have CIs especially the ones who just got implanted.
 
I was getting a headache and I wanted the Tylenol to kick in before I go back to OZ! :)

I concede to that, it was exhausting....God, I felt really out of place hearing those high pitched voices! Did you get a direct connect audio cable set? Wait til you hear through that one!
 
Oh, and another thing.....Did your audi ask you if you wanted the processor status lights on? Its usually meant for kids, but I felt like a walking christmas tree!
 
Oh, and another thing.....Did your audi ask you if you wanted the processor status lights on? Its usually meant for kids, but I felt like a walking christmas tree!

Funny that you mention that because that was one of the first things that I requested to be turned off. There was no way I was going to go out to a restaurant and sit there blinking. :)

Do you happen to remember what your volume levels were? Mine for the first 15 electrodes are around the neighborhood of 155ish, the 16th electrode I received no response. She stopped around 290.
 
I concede to that, it was exhausting....God, I felt really out of place hearing those high pitched voices! Did you get a direct connect audio cable set? Wait til you hear through that one!

I got that direct connect cable and adapter. I just took them out of the box and put them in the "man bag" that came with it. I want to wait until I get at least a little more comprehension to speech believe I start using that. :cool: How does the direct connect sound?
 
That's great! Good luck with the sounds improving over time. Thanks for sharing your experiences and it helps me to learn more about the use of CIs so I can keep them in mind at work when working with chidlren who have CIs especially the ones who just got implanted.

The only way I can honestly describe it is certain sounds have what you and I would call with a hearing aid, the feedback. High pitched feedback. I know that audiologist are much gentler with kids with their mappings but I can imagine how scary some of the initial sensations might sound to a child. Simple things like paper is kind of driving nuts at the moment but I am getting use to it.
 
Funny that you mention that because that was one of the first things that I requested to be turned off. There was no way I was going to go out to a restaurant and sit there blinking. :)

Do you happen to remember what your volume levels were? Mine for the first 15 electrodes are around the neighborhood of 155ish, the 16th electrode I received no response. She stopped around 290.

It ranged from 240 at low frequencies, 260's average for mid frequencies, then tapering 197 at high frequencies - with lows starting at electrode 1 to highs at electrode 16. Strange, I have all 16 activated.
 
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