New and a little nervous and from Detroit

Barby1008

Barby1008

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Hello. my name is Barbara, or Barb or Barby. I am struggling. I am losing my hearing. I have been diagnosed with Meniere's disease. That just makes me dizzy. I am also severely HoH.

I am over 50, and live in Michigan (Metro Detroit). I am blessed to work in a supportive job site. I am using a CapTel phone but its very difficult so I prefer email. I used to be scared of telling people I can't hear and tried to trick them into not knowing. Now I just say that I'm hearing impaired. My voice mail at work gives my email address and instructions to email me. I have hearing aids and can't stand them. Even with them I have poor word recognition and the world is too loud.

I want to learn asl but learning a new language at my age is a challenge. I am up for the challenge but find it's useless when you have no one who is willing to learn or try.

Everyone acts like one day I will be able to hear again. Its very isolating when you are all alone in a crowded room. Its frustrating to have to say, "Im sorry can you repeat that?", and watch the' person roll their eyes and get annoyed. Everyone acts like I am the only person who needs to change. No one is willing to learn to sign. They get mad at what I don't hear.

I don't know what to expect from this group. I hope to learn and find people who can understand. Any tips or advice is welcome! Thanks for taking the time to read this! Happy New Year!
 
Barby1008 said:
Hello. my name is Barbara, or Barb or Barby. I am struggling. I am losing my hearing. I have been diagnosed with Meniere's disease. That just makes me dizzy. I am also severely HoH.

I am over 50, and live in Michigan (Metro Detroit). I am blessed to work in a supportive job site. I am using a CapTel phone but its very difficult so I prefer email. I used to be scared of telling people I can't hear and tried to trick them into not knowing. Now I just say that I'm hearing impaired. My voice mail at work gives my email address and instructions to email me. I have hearing aids and can't stand them. Even with them I have poor word recognition and the world is too loud.

I want to learn asl but learning a new language at my age is a challenge. I am up for the challenge but find it's useless when you have no one who is willing to learn or try.

Everyone acts like one day I will be able to hear again. Its very isolating when you are all alone in a crowded room. Its frustrating to have to say, "Im sorry can you repeat that?", and watch the' person roll their eyes and get annoyed. Everyone acts like I am the only person who needs to change. No one is willing to learn to sign. They get mad at what I don't hear.

I don't know what to expect from this group. I hope to learn and find people who can understand. Any tips or advice is welcome! Thanks for taking the time to read this! Happy New Year!
Click to expand...

Welcome! I understand how difficult it is to adjust to hearing loss and dealing with people who you have spoke with easily to all of the the sudden it's a struggle to communicate. And how sign language isn't always benefitful if no one is around to use it or willing to use it.

If you have a smartphone maybe you could try out Live Transcribe app (andriod) which is a voice recognition that allows you to speak into text literally like captioning. It doesn't always work but might help in giving you clues to what people might be saying. And maybe even a a simple type note app to encourage people to type in what they are saying.

Know that lot of of people are in the same boat as you. Hope that suggestion helps.
Happy New Year to you!
Annie
 
Barby1008 said:
Hello. my name is Barbara, or Barb or Barby. I am struggling. I am losing my hearing. I have been diagnosed with Meniere's disease. That just makes me dizzy. I am also severely HoH.

I am over 50, and live in Michigan (Metro Detroit). I am blessed to work in a supportive job site. I am using a CapTel phone but its very difficult so I prefer email. I used to be scared of telling people I can't hear and tried to trick them into not knowing. Now I just say that I'm hearing impaired. My voice mail at work gives my email address and instructions to email me. I have hearing aids and can't stand them. Even with them I have poor word recognition and the world is too loud.

I want to learn asl but learning a new language at my age is a challenge. I am up for the challenge but find it's useless when you have no one who is willing to learn or try.

Everyone acts like one day I will be able to hear again. Its very isolating when you are all alone in a crowded room. Its frustrating to have to say, "Im sorry can you repeat that?", and watch the' person roll their eyes and get annoyed. Everyone acts like I am the only person who needs to change. No one is willing to learn to sign. They get mad at what I don't hear.

I don't know what to expect from this group. I hope to learn and find people who can understand. Any tips or advice is welcome! Thanks for taking the time to read this! Happy New Year!
Click to expand...
I know exactly how you feel. I took ASL in college but no one to sign with and just end up losing the skill over time as well. Its hard ( almost 52 here ) born hoh and went completely deaf by 2004, got implanted 12/2014-3/2015... Bi-Lateral Cochlear now but still prefer to go full deaf.
 
Hi Barb,
Your post caught my attention because like you, I am over 50 and I don't live too far from you - I'm just outside Toledo, Ohio. I am hearing but serious about learning ASL and I would love to have you as a learning buddy. I am brand new and start my first class this week, but am studying already at Lifeprint.com. I have installed the Glide chat app (https://www.glide.me/) on my phone that enables sending video messages rather than text messages. If you'd be interested in getting that, we could start messaging together with slow, basic conversational signing to help us both along with our learning. My username on Glide is aqmdesx.
 
Same, at present rate of decline I'll be profoundly deaf in a year or two, I've stopped trying to understand unless I have to, stoped talking unless I have to, when you talk they think you can hear, in my second year of trying to relearn ASL, the condition that is taking my hearing also makes it hard to remember, frustrating, never quit trying :bye:
 
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