I am a hearing woman dating a HoH man (both in our 30's). He only uses oral communication with everyone, having no interest in communicating with ASL whatsoever; instead, he prefers lip-reading and using his residual hearing to communicate. A little more background on him is that he is an only child who lost his hearing at age 3, has no hearing in one ear and can hear very little from his other ear. Without the help of his one and only hearing aid, he cannot hear at all. He is an amazing person who has overcome many difficult obstacles in his life. He does not have much dating experience, as I am the first woman he has seriously dated. We only met five months ago, and up until a month ago things were great. I am inspired by his strength and drive in life, he is the sweetest, most generous, loving man I have ever met in my life.
Our biggest struggle lately has been communication. I feel that he assumes what I am going to say, what I did say, and what I will say to avoid having to go through the trouble of asking. Additionally, I feel that I have to repeat every single thing I say, which is extremely frustrating. Sometimes he'll ask me a question and as I am answering he will look away because he is distracted by something else and I'll have to repeat my entire response or he will only hear half of it and assume the rest. Also, he tries to have conversations in the car while we are driving, which is virtually impossible because to have a conversation the lighting needs to be adequate, and we need to be facing one another -which we cannot do while driving.
I obviously know that to be in a happy healthy relationship with a HoH man I have to expect and accept the communication issues that go with it. I was just hoping that there is someone else out there who can relate to what I am going through and offer up any advice on how we can make communication easier. It's difficult enough that he and I cannot talk about or listen to music, cannot dine in loud restaurants, cannot enjoy any of the sounds of nature, cannot have a deep conversation, sit around a bonfire with friends and talk, cannot sing a song on the radio, cannot go to/have dinner parties without him feeling left out, cannot tell each other jokes (because they're misheard or misunderstood). --Having communication problems on top of it makes things one million times worse.
I do love this man so much, but I'm beginning to feel that he deserves someone with the patience to deal with the communication barrier. I'm wondering if I'm the right person for him because he has been through enough and doesn't need me to make him feel bad that he cannot hear. He deserves the world.
I'm afraid that if things don't improve soon, I will give up on the relationship. Any constructive advice? Thanks so much for reading this.
Our biggest struggle lately has been communication. I feel that he assumes what I am going to say, what I did say, and what I will say to avoid having to go through the trouble of asking. Additionally, I feel that I have to repeat every single thing I say, which is extremely frustrating. Sometimes he'll ask me a question and as I am answering he will look away because he is distracted by something else and I'll have to repeat my entire response or he will only hear half of it and assume the rest. Also, he tries to have conversations in the car while we are driving, which is virtually impossible because to have a conversation the lighting needs to be adequate, and we need to be facing one another -which we cannot do while driving.
I obviously know that to be in a happy healthy relationship with a HoH man I have to expect and accept the communication issues that go with it. I was just hoping that there is someone else out there who can relate to what I am going through and offer up any advice on how we can make communication easier. It's difficult enough that he and I cannot talk about or listen to music, cannot dine in loud restaurants, cannot enjoy any of the sounds of nature, cannot have a deep conversation, sit around a bonfire with friends and talk, cannot sing a song on the radio, cannot go to/have dinner parties without him feeling left out, cannot tell each other jokes (because they're misheard or misunderstood). --Having communication problems on top of it makes things one million times worse.
I do love this man so much, but I'm beginning to feel that he deserves someone with the patience to deal with the communication barrier. I'm wondering if I'm the right person for him because he has been through enough and doesn't need me to make him feel bad that he cannot hear. He deserves the world.
I'm afraid that if things don't improve soon, I will give up on the relationship. Any constructive advice? Thanks so much for reading this.