I was impressed on how they progressed post -activation. One CI user had freedom CI for 3 years (next month) and she is able to understand her three daughters, and is able to recongise the voice (who is who) I asked their cons of the CI, is that a LOT of patience is required, headaches and frustrating noises but after a while, they will disappear. I asked the CI in Sydney via facebook, same loss as mine, and is progressing slowly very well.
This sounds so like me, I am nearly 3 years post implant (ironically next month!!) I have a freedom and will be upgrading to N5 on 3rd August.
I am able to recongise all 9 of my students' voices in my class and able to reply to their simple questions like can i go to the toilet/library/reception without lipreading and they all are autisic, their voices are monotonal, mumbling, not clear at all (one or two are but they have up and downs days) etc... Yes your new friends are right patience is important and low expectations too.
Now days when people speak without me looking at them, they could be a ransom person on the street that i don't know i could pick out what they are saying by just passing them, this surprises me every day and i am amazed in how ON earth I could hear that!!! One day I had to stop a gentleman to ask him if he did say so so and he replied yes..... then looked at me if i was a complete nutter!!
I didn't expect i could reach this far, I took one day at a time. I read a lot of audio books/ watch tv following subtitles with talking (not always perfect but it's good practice for recongising missing words and catching up with the next word)