Stop waiting around

Trivia night victors! 

Guys. Stop waiting to do things. 
I see this a lot with transplant people--or people with CF--but also with people who are just nice, normal people. 
"Oh, I'll wait until later to do that."
"Oh, someday...."
"Oh, it's just not right right now."
Guys. 
If you want to go to school, go. 
If you want to learn something, learn it.
If you want to bake cookies all day, do it at least once.
If you want to learn Spanish, sign up for Duolingo. 
STOP WAITING.
Stop saying, Oh, when this happens. 
Nuh uh. 
DO IT NOW.
Yeah, sometimes it's not plausible. I get that. Sometimes you have to save money. I get that too. 
But then DO IT. Save the money. Make it happen. Dedicate yourself to it. 
Don't wait. 
Don't use your body as an excuse not to do things. "Oh, I have crappy lung function, I can't go to school, I can't work, I can't do anything by lie here and watch Netflix."
I've been there. Before my transplant, I slept for 13 hours a day. Seriously. If not more. When I was "awake", I was sort of zombie-fied. And that's what happens when you're close to death. 
But EVEN THEN--I went to work. I went out. I saw my family and friends.
Yes, when life changes, more opportunities can open up. 
But you will lose your life waiting around for things to happen. 
So STOP IT. 
Learn the things. Do the things. LIVE YOUR LIFE. Even if you're almost dead, you can STILL LIVE YOUR LIFE while you have it.

Bookshelf: World War II Books

Bookshelf is a new series that will focus on books that cover a particular topic or time period. I'm trying to recommend only books I've read, but sometimes I'll throw in recommendations from my friends and family members! 

Today we're talking about World War II books. Unless you're my mother, who is a WWII nut, you are probably rolling your eyes. Every other book that comes out seems to involve WWII, even tangenitally. I'm a little burned out, myself!

But a friend of mine asked me for book recommendations about this time period, for kids and adults, and fiction and non-fiction, so I thought I'd comply, and list the good WWII books I've run across. 

Non-fiction

(I would recommend these for middle school and up. I read The Diary of Anne Frank young, and we read Night and Farewell to Manzanar in eighth grade.) 

• The Hiding Place, by Corrie ten Boom. This is one of my favorite books--I read it at least once a year. Corrie ten Boom and her family were part of the Dutch resistance, hiding Jews in their Haarlem home and procuring ration cards for Jews in hiding. Eventually, the family was arrested, and Corrie, her sister Betsie, and her father were sent to prison, and, eventually, the Ravensbruck concentration camp. The deep Christian spirit of the ten Boom family pervades the book, and that is what makes it stand out to me. Corrie isn't a paper Christian--her struggles are real, and she discusses them frankly. This would be a great book for family discussion with older kids, too. 

• Farewell to Manzanar, by Jennie Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston. This book is different from all the others, in that it focuses on the internment of Japanese-Americans on the West Coast during WWII. Jennie, age seven, and her family were sent to Manzanar relocation camp, in the desert of California, during WWII. Their crime? Being Japanese-Americans. Jennie tells her story, beginning before the war, taking us through living in the camp, and ending with her family's release and attempt to settle back into "normal" life after their experiences. (A good book to dovetail with this, for younger kids, is listed in the next section.) 

• The Diary of Anne Frank, by Anne Frank/Otto Frank. Really, the quintessential WWII book. You have to start with this, I think. Anne's story has been made into movies, a stage play, and the house is preserved as a museum in Amsterdam, but this is the book that lead to all those. Anne's diary begins shortly before she and her family go into hiding, and ends a few days before they are arrested and sent to the concentration camps. Otto, Frank's father, published the diary after he returned to Amsterdam following his imprisonment. 
   
• Night, by Eli Wiesel. Wiesel relays his account of life in a Romanian town before WWII, the arrest of himself and his family, and his experiences in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. 

Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself. Never.

--Night

• Unbroken, Laura Hillenbrand. A different book--this tells the story of Louis Zamperini, an Italian-American from California who competed at the Berlin Olympics, and then joined the armed forces as an airman. When his plane crashed over the Pacific, Zamperini and his crewmate survive--only to be rescued, weeks later, by the Japanese, and sent to a Japanese prison camp. 

Fiction: children/YA

• The Molly series (book 1 and book 2), by Valerie Tripp. One of the classic American Girl stories--if you can find the original books, those are much better, especially for historical content in the back as a supplement. If you can't, the stories are still great. Molly lives in Illinois during WWII--her father is an Army doctor. On the home front, Molly's mom works at the Red Cross; the family has a victory garden; Molly and her friends participate in several events to help the war effort, and Molly's family takes in a British girl, Emily Bennet, whose family lives in London. The stories are rich in historical details, and Molly is a fun character. 

• The War That Saved My Life and The War I Finally Won, by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley. Ada and Jamie live in London with their mother, who hides Ada in their rundown apartment because Ada has a clubfoot. When the Blitz starts, her mother sends Jamie off to the country to stay safe--and Ada sneaks away with him. They are assigned to live with a woman named Susan, who is reluctant to take them in at first. These stories aren't just great for their historical content, but also for the character of Ada, whose stubborn determination drives the stories.

• Number the Stars, by Lois Lowry. Annemarie lives in Copenhagen with her little sister, Kirsti, and her parents, and enjoys going to school and playing make-believe with her best friend, Ellen, who lives in their apartment building. But Ellen is also Jewish. When her family hears of the plan to arrest the Jews of the country, Annemarie's family takes in Ellen. Can Anne-Marie's family save her best friend's life? This story is compelling, beautifully written, and is one of my favorite books, period--I re-read it a lot. I highly recommend it. Lowry won the 1990 Newberry Medal for this book. 
   
• Dear America: The Fences Between Us, by Kirby Lawson. To dovetail with Farewell to Manzanar, this story is the diary of Piper David, a "PK" (preacher's kid), whose father's Seattle congregation is made up of mostly Japanese-Americans. When most of them are sent to a relocation camp in Idaho, Piper's father announces that he is going with them--and is taking Piper. 
   
• Dear America: Early Sunday Morning, by Barry Denenberg. Amber's family moves to Hawaii for her father's military job--he's assigned to Pearl Harbor. Her diary covers the months before, and after, the attack on Pearl Harbor. 
   
• Dear Canada: Pieces of the Past, by Carol Matas. Rose is a Holocaust survivor who is living in Canada with various guardians. Her diary relates her experience of arrest, living in the camps, and trying to survive and rebuild her life in a new country, without her parents, afterwards. 
   
• The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak. Liesel, a young German girl, is sent to live with a new foster family, Hans and Rose Hubermann. Distraught at the death of her younger brother, Liesel finds solace in books, as well as in the freedom fighter, Max, that the Hubermanns hide in their basement. A fabulous story with an...interesting narrator. 

Fiction: adults

• The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah. Hannah details the lives of two sisters, Vianne and Isabelle, who live in German-occupied France. The two sisters are estranged from their father, and from each other, and both must do what they can to survive the war. I don't want to spoil it, but let's just say it's worth reading, and is based on the life of a Belgian woman. 

• Lilac Girls, by Martha Hall Kelly. Based on the true story of "The Rabbits", Lilac Girls follows three women: A Polish teenager, Kasia, who is involved with the resistance; Caroline, a New York City socialite who works at the French consulate in New York City, and Herta, an ambitious young German doctor. All three of these women collide in a memorable story, based on events that most people have probably never heard about. 

• La's Orchestra Saves the World, by Alexander McCall Smith. Lavender, or "La", moves to the Suffolk countryside to escape both the Blitz and a horrible marriage. In her tiny community, she decides to start an orchestra to bring the people together against the ravages and fear of WWII. She also meets a Polish man named Feliks, who will end up having a far-reaching impact on her life. 
   
• Everyone Brave is Forgiven, by Chris Cleave. Based on the experiences of Cleave's grandparents, the novel is set during the Blitz and the Siege of Malta, and follows two people: Mary, in England, and Tom, who has decided to ignore the war, until his best friend signs up--and then he can't ignore the war anymore. 
   
• All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the novel follows Marie-Laure, a blind girl who lives in Paris with her father, and Werner, a German orphan. Marie-Laure and Warner's stories collide in Saint-Malo, a town on the French coast, in 1944. Doerr's storytelling is intricate and absorbing, with great attention to detail and plot. 

All links are Amazon affiliate links

It's Survey Time!

I've been writing for a few years now, and I think it's time to do my first-ever reader survey!

I want to know what you like to read about here, what you don't like to read about, things you wish I wrote about....really anything. This is your chance to tell me your opinions!

So just go here, and fill out the survey! Thank you muchly! 

Sound and Silence Part IV: Accommodations

Last Saturday was World Hearing Day, so I showed a few shots of my Bionic Ear on instagram. Some people were shocked to see I had one! So I decided it was time to do a little updated series here about why I have one, how I got it, how I like it, and what life is like with one. Here are the previous parts: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3. 

This is the meat and potatoes post. 

First, let's acknowledge that deaf and hard-of-hearing people are often not accommodated. Curb cuts are put in at corners, even when there are no sidewalks. Braille on signs is ubiquitous. (although I know blind people often need things they don't get--like audible crossing alerts!) But captioning has to be fought for. The ADA doesn't require TV stations to caption things unless they get federal funding, for example. 

So the first thing people like me need to do is ASK. And that's hard, I know. But we need to be more comfortable about saying, I'm sorry, I'm hearing impaired. I need accommodation. If we're not asking, we're definitely not going to get! 

With that in mind, knowing what we know now, how can we, as individuals and society, accommodate or adapt what we do for people with hearing loss? 

Here are a few suggestions. Some are for people, some are for institutions. 

1. Be patient. I talked about this in the last installment, but please repeat yourself if you're asked to. Don't get angry. Also, you don't necessarily need to talk louder. Sometimes you need to be clearer. As in, speak slower, enunciate, look at me. Don't hide your mouth! It doesn't necessarily have to be over the top. It might take some adjusting. But please be patient. 

2. Provide alternate means of contact. If you run a church or volunteer organization, for example, don't just provide a phone number. Provide an email address. If you just provide a phone number, I can't contact you, and then I can't help out. Say if texting is acceptable, too! (This last tip is for older people, who might have landlines only. Tell me if it's a cell number. If it is, then I'll try texting.) 

(And a note: I can leave messages on voice mails. That's because I know to leave a message at the beep or when the voice stops. That's different than trying to talk to a person. Does that make sense?) 

3. Provide a chat interface. This is mostly for businesses. If you only provide a phone number, I am screwed. And don't say, "Oh well we have a TTY!" I don't have a TTY.  It's $250-600 for a TTY. Also, TTY use in general is declining as people have email and text. Folks. Come into the 21st century. Provide a chat interface on your website! (It's like how cars had tape players in them well into the early 2000s. Huh? A tape player? What?) Chat interface, the ability to place requests on a website (like AAA!), customer service email, apps....it's a wonderful new world of technology. Use it. Please. Look, if Bobbi Brown Cosmetics, The Disney Store, AAA, and just about every other e-commerce site can provide a chat interface, you can too, government people! 

And do not tell me that it's not secure to do it any way but over the phone! I email my transplant nurses all the time for stuff--we're sending highly "private" health information over email. My bank has chat. I send sensitive financial information over chat! Come on! Don't tell me that the retirement agency or SSDI or whatever can't do the same thing. You can. You're lazy. That's what it comes down to. You. Are. Lazy.  Don't be lazy. 

Let me illustrate what happens when you are lazy, companies and agencies: 

It means that I have to ask my parents to translate the conversation for us. It means that I have to fill out paperwork saying that yes, my parents are decent people and aren't going to lie to you about me. It means that I can't communicate with you on my own. It means that we have to set up times for me and a parent to talk to you, so that we can get something done. This means that my dad has to leave work early, or work from home, or leave for work late, so that he can help me here, or that my mom has to rearrange her day. It is a HUGE inconvenience to everyone. 

If you provide chat interface, then we have none of these problems. It's all easy. And simple. And, dare I say, secure. (My dad is an IT professional. He deals with this stuff all the time. He knows. He can tell you the whole "It's not secure" argument is crap.) 

4. Provide transcripts or closed captioning. If you're doing an online course, please provide captions or a transcript of what you're saying. 

Video is tough. The sound isn't great, a lot of the time. The best way for me to understand someone, in general, is for me to "learn" your voice, and the easiest way to do that is to read captions while you talk. (Obviously, this is not in a real life scenario. :-p In real life, the more I listen to you, the more I learn your voice, your cadences, your vocabulary, and that helps me understand you better.)  But until you get to that point--caption videos, or provide transcripts. 

Also, video companies? Caption ALL THE THINGS. Don't just caption the movie. I like to watch the special features! And it should be illegal to release a video in the U.S. that doesn't have captioning. I mean, come on. TVs do have captioning--most of them. Some older ones don't. But that doesn't mean that they automatically caption videos or TV shows. They do not! 

TV and movie folk: please caption your shows and your channels. Some of you don't. That means I can't watch you. Fix that, please. 

5. Turn the captions on! If you're in charge of a waiting room, please turn the captions on the TV. It is so annoying to hear just mindless sound. Imagine a jackhammer going off around you constantly. That's what it sounds like. Or a baby crying. It's just NOISE. With captions, it's not noise anymore!

In the same vein: 

Movie theaters: Provide captioning devices. Please. I like the movies too! (Marcus Cinemas does, for every movie. It's a godsend. So thankful they're my local chain!) 

Airports: Provide a messaging board at all gates and in the concourses, so people can see updates. Provide a transcript of the safety talk. Really be aware of your hearing-impaired passengers and make sure they get the information they need. Write it down if you have to! It's no good for me to tell you I'm hearing impaired, and then you look at me like I have lobsters crawling out of my ears. 

6. Put in a telecoil system. This is mostly for churches and other gathering places where people are using microphones. Telecoil systems are great! 

Sign indicating my church has a hearing loop installed. This means I can understand the homilies! Yay! 

7. Use microphones There are few things in the world that irritate me more than people who do not use microphones, when a microphone is easily available. Do not do the crappy, "oh, the acoustics are fine." THEY ARE NOT. You are being silly and denying people the ability to hear and understand you. Especially if the place has a telecoil system installed, use the microphones! Otherwise the telecoil system is no good! 

If we're in a place that's echo-y, like a big meeting room or something, and you don't use a microphone, I'm lost. Most people do not know how to project. After a few minutes, I get very irritated and cranky because I have to work so hard to understand you. And if you do this continually I will stop coming to these events, because I will get irritated and angry, and sad, because I cannot hear and understand. And sadly, this seems to happen a lot with church stuff. So....yeah. I might be a leeeeetle annoyed about this. 

Also, face out. Show me your face! If I can see your mouth, that helps. (See the last entry, which talked about lip reading)

If you don't have hearing problems, I want you to imagine being surrounded by a swarm of bees and trying to listen through that. Or being underwater, and trying to hear someone speaking above you. Now imagine that happening for an hour, two hours, three hours....you'll start to get some idea of what it's like to try to hear and understand people in this situation. It's mumblemumblemumblemumble. How long would you want to put up with that? Not long, I'd wager. 

8. In design, think about acoustics. Places where there are metal floors, metal ceilings, metal everything? That's terrible. There is nothing to absorb the sound. It's one big sound magnifier. The ADA requires places to have wheelchair ramps and access*. Do the same thing for the hard of hearing. Think about it. It might not be "trendy", but you'll make me a lot happier. Have some carpet. Have some wood. Have things that absorb sound and don't make it so loud. (in the same vein--braille menus, y'all. Come on. Large print, too!) 

9. Be understanding. It can be hard to have to work at hearing. Because really, it's work. When I've been in a group of people for a long time, I have to work hard to understand people, what's happening around me, etc. So if I say, hey, I gotta go, or I'm going to bed, don't be all "but it's EARLY!" Or whatever. My brain is very, very tired. I probably have a big headache. Just let me go. :) 

10. Inclusion. We talked about this before. But if you're in a group with a hard of hearing person, make sure to include him in the conversation. If I ask you what's being said, please tell me. Don't ignore my request. It makes me angry. I love to talk. If I'm just sitting there, not talking, chances are it's because I have no idea what's happening and no one's cluing me in. This. Is. Sad. Please don't do that. :) That doesn't mean that you have to be all over me every five seconds. But do make an effort to talk to me! Because otherwise, SADNESS!

I think I've covered everything...is there anything else you want to know? Drop it in the combox and I'll answer!

* Doesn't mean they do it well....see my series on the ADA about this. 

Sound and Silence Part III: Living with the CI

Last Saturday was World Hearing Day, so I showed a few shots of my Bionic Ear on instagram. Some people were shocked to see I had one! So I decided it was time to do a little updated series here about why I have one, how I got it, how I like it, and what life is like with one. You can read the other parts here: Part I, Part II. 

So let's talk about my day-to-day CI experience (and a little bit about accommodations, at the end, but we'll talk more about that tomorrow.). 

There are times I don't wear my CI: 

• When I'm sleeping (although I can--it's just not really comfortable. But when I'm in the hospital, I do.) 
• When I'm swimming * 
• When I ride certain rides (roller coasters? It comes off. I really don't want to have to look for it later...) 

There are also times when my head just hurts. Keep in mind--there's a magnet in bone. That's going to hurt sometimes. On those days, I have to take the CI off and I'm deaf for most of the day. It's not fun, but it's not terrible. It's inconvenient. 

I do have to keep the hair there cut short, or the magnet has trouble connecting. I don't shave it, but I do cut it reaaaallly close. 

Currently I'm having issues with the magnet. The outside processor doesn't always like to attach correctly so there are times when it will shift and I'll have to move it in place to get it to work again. That's irritating, but it should stop when I get a new processor. 

That's a fun process, by the way, because insurance companies don't like to pay for new processors. The one I currently have will be declared obsolete next year, and then insurance companies will have to pay for an upgrade, because my current one can't be fixed anymore, and there won't be parts made for it anymore. But until then, they won't. Well, they will. We'll just have to fight them on it. (Here's a trick, guys: Never assume that insurance won't pay for something. Don't just pay the bill. ARGUE WITH THEM!)

Why insurance companies do not pay for hearing aids, or CI upgrades, is beyond my understanding. It's so ridiculous. Hearing is just as important as sight, but hearing gets shafted. (Part IV is going to be all about accommodations. So more on that then!) For example, insurance will pay for an entire evaluation and surgery and a processor for my right ear, but they won't pay for an upgrade for my left ear. Which is cheaper? Which is better for everyone? And which will the insurance company pay for? Yeah. sigh. 

Cochlear implants cost about $5,000. Now, the first one is covered. If you have surgery, then the surgery, the implant, the processor--all that's covered. But upgrades aren't. About every five years or so, you can try and I've had luck with insurance paying then. This year is my five year mark for my current processor. So we will either try this year, to get a new one, or try next year, when it's more likely we won't have to argue as much! 

Think about cell phone or computer updates. Every time there's an upgrade, it's better, right? CIs are the same way. The one I have now is much better than my first one. There are not just cosmetic things (i.e., it's smaller) that are "better", but also in terms of power, of programming, of what it can do. So it's not like upgrading to be "cool". It really is a substantial difference, usually. 

The batteries are around $200-250 each. At some point they stop holding a charge and you have to replace them. I currently have three, but one is cracked so I don't use it on a daily basis. It's an emergency battery. The two I have I rotate, so they'll last longer. 

There are other parts, like microphone covers, and ear hooks, and things like that, that have to be paid for. You get some of these things when you upgrade, or get your processor, but often I have to buy more. 

In general, my CI is great. But like I said in the last installment, I can't use the phone. Everyone sounds like Charlie Brown's teacher. (That goes for people like my parents, too. I should know their voices better than any other--and I do--but I can't call them on the phone. That should tell you how terrible my hearing is on the phone.) 

I do rely on lip reading, a little bit. But not many words are lip-readable. I think around 10% of English words are uniquely identifiable in lip reading. Go talk to yourself in front of the mirror and notice how many words look similar. Really, for me, lip reading helps in context. But on an airplane? Forget it. There's way too much noise for me to understand what the flight attendant is saying, even if she's leaning right over me. I can guess that it's time for beverage orders because she'll  have the little pad out. :) Flying is sort of rough, when you're hearing impaired. **

FaceTime is a godsend. That's really the only way I can use the phone. Do I have a cell phone? Yes. :) But I don't use it as a phone, most often. I FaceTime people, and I text. And I did take ASL in high school, just for fun--God prompting, there....

In restaurants, I want to sit against a wall, or in an area where there won't be sound coming from behind me. I'll generally adjust my CI settings, but I try to make as "optimal" an arrangement as possible for me, to help out. If you're walking on my right side and talking to me, I'm not going to hear you as well as I could. 

The other thing about the CI is that there's a little bit of a lag...a few seconds. So sometimes I'll ask someone to repeat something, and then I'll understand what they said, because my brain has caught up. 

Also, please folks--repeat what you said. Don't say you said "nothing." You clearly said something. Don't huff and puff if I ask you to repeat yourself. If you do that, then guess what? I don't ask you anymore. And then things get worse. And then people say, well, why didn't you ask for the person to repeat it? BECAUSE PEOPLE GET ANGRY. So please, do not roll your eyes or sigh or be like, why aren't you listening. I am. Believe me. 

It is very, very, very irritating to be left out of conversations. A lot of the time, especially in large groups, I don't know what's going on if people don't keep me in the loop. So, please do that. Tell me what we're talking about. Include me. Imagine you're at a table with people and everyone is talking around you. It's not fun. It makes you not want to do things! So please include people. 

My CI is much better than my hearing aids ever were. But there are still things I can't do, and there are still accommodations I need to make. It's not magic. It's awesome, and I'm glad I have it. But it's not perfect. I'm underlining that point so people really understand that. 

*There are things I could do to swim with the CI--there's a waterproof cover, for example. I just don't. But I could get one of those. 

**Flight attendants are just part of it. The safety thing? I can't understand that speech at all. Everything the pilot says? No idea. And we won't even TALK about how airports don't always have message boards, so I can miss important announcements about flight gates being changed, etc. If my friend Mary hadn't been with me for our California adventure, I probably would've missed my flight home, because they changed the gate! It is TERRIBLE. Fortunately airports let you take a "support person" back, so I have people wait with me before I board. I can--and have--flown alone. It's just stressful because I have to be on constant alert for any changes. 

Sound and Silence Part II: The Cochlear Implant

Last Saturday was World Hearing Day, so I showed a few shots of my Bionic Ear on instagram. Some people were shocked to see I had one! So I decided it was time to do a little updated series here about why I have one, how I got it, how I like it, and what life is like with one. Here's part one. 

So, what the heck is a CI, and how does it work?

I'm going to keep this really basic. I'm not an audiologist and I don't play one on TV.  But this handy chart should help. You see the external bit, but yes, there are things in my head other than my brain. There's the magnet, to hold the processor on, and there's the wire that goes into the cochlea. Remember that the reason my hearing sucks is because my hair cells are dead. The hair cells live in the cochlea. So the wire replaces them, in a sense. The wire has an "array"--I think mine has 24--of sound things. I know that's super technical. I forget the real name. But there are24 different entries on that wire that can be individually fine-tuned. (More about that later) So instead of hundreds of hair cells...I have 24 electrode arrays. Now, it's better than nothing! But I note this to illustrate that CIs are not perfect replacements for real hearing. 

I had my surgery in May of 2008. Post transplant I had a lot to deal with--I had a skin graft surgery that November, and then we had to try hearing aids first, and then I had to get myself to agree to having a CI, and so with all that, it was a long-ish process to actually getting one. 

The one great thing is that I was "post-lingual"--meaning, I knew how to talk. (Boy howdy, can I talk.) If you have had severe hearing loss for a long time, or if you're a baby getting one, then there's hearing therapy involved. Even now, there are sounds I hear and it takes  me a minute to figure out what it is. (While writing this, with my CI on, I heard a crazy loud, scary noise. What is that?! It took me a few seconds, but I figured it out--crows.) Everyone knows the person who is hard of hearing who speaks loudly because she can't hear herself. I can hear myself. I'm just loud. (There are times when I can't hear myself as well--when I have the telecoil on, for example, so in church.) 

My ENT is fabulous. I've had him for years--he works a lot with CF folk, and more and more CF folk are having CIs put in. (ENTs also do all our sinus work. We have a lot of sinus work...I am lucky in that area. My sinuses tend to behave.) If you're in the central Ohio area, Dr. Willett, Ohio ENT is my guy and I adore him.  

So the day of surgery was just like any other surgery. Port accessed. Ready to rock and roll. You stay over night, of course, because people are putting things in your head! My audiologist, who is also at Ohio ENT, actually stimulated the CI during surgery to make sure it "worked" and that it had been put in correctly. That's a key part of the process, because I didn't get to attach the processor for a month, due to healing. You don't want to attach the processor and have it not work! 

For 21-30 days, your head heals. I wore my hearing aids, and waited for activation day. This is the day you see when those videos are posted to Facebook or YouTube where a kid or someone hears for the first time. Mine was not that dramatic. But instantly, small sounds came back--the sound of the turn signal, typing, things like that. 

(When your hearing goes, it's usually the upper registers that go first--high notes, high voices, likes kids and women. And fainter sounds, like turn signals, things beeping, etc.) 

My audiologist then programmed the CI. You can have up to four programs. Again, I don't want to get super technical, but I have all four slots on my CI filled with programs. There's a tiny button on the processor that I hit to cycle through them. The first is my "normal" program. That allows sound in from all sides, and is good all-purpose. The second is focused on who is directly in front of me, and cuts out side noise and background noise to an extent. This is good for  noisy places and restaurants. I have another program that focuses this even more. The fourth program is a richer program that's generally for music, but I can use it as an everyday program, too--you get a wider range of sounds and frequencies. 

There is also the telecoil. This cuts out all sound except what you hear through the telecoil system, which lets in whatever's coming in through a microphone.* This is what I use in church, and it's amazing. It's like someone is speaking distinctly and clearly into my ear. You are also, supposedly, able to use this for the phone. That is not my experience. (More on that later.) Of course the issue with the telecoil is that the other person has to have the microphone on, or the system is useless. (It does work for lecterns, too, or stand microphones.) 

Now, I have one implant. I don't have one in my right ear, because I want that 20% of real hearing that I have. When a CI is implanted, it removes any residual hearing you have left. I am truly deaf in my left ear without it. But I don't wear my CI all the time, so I need some residual hearing. This allows me to hear my alarm clock and other loud noises. There are also times when the batteries will inexplicably die. (This happened a lot with my first processor, not so much with my current one.) The 20% also helps out my CI, in a sense. It gives me some sense of directionality--where a sound is coming from, although not a lot. When I'm swimming, I can hear loud things. If I know your voice REALLY well--meaning, you're my parent or my best friend or my sibling--then I can decipher what you're saying, sometimes, with just my right ear. 

I use rechargeable batteries in my CI. I have three of them, and I rotate them. They get put in and can last about 15-24 hours on a full charge. I tend to not put my implant in early in the morning, because I sort of like the silence. But that's changing as I switch my workout routine to being in the morning. I need to hear the video. 

I'm using "hear" here, but what I really mean is "understand". I can hear lots of things. That doesn't mean I understand them, or process them. For example, I heard the crazy bird sounds this morning, but I had no idea what it was. 

Also--and I'll talk about this more in the next piece--but everyone's CI experience is very different. Rush Limbaugh has a CI, and he said he can't learn new music. I can, because, as we saw, I was very musically inclined and my ears had been trained that way. My brain still knows that language, in a sense. I work hard to learn new music. Instrumental music is difficult because it all sounds like noise, at first. But I can learn new songs and new vocal pieces with the CI--I just have to approach it differently. Some people with a CI can use phone adaptation stuff. I can't. I don't know why. But more on that next. 

*The telecoil can be "mixed"--basically, you can determine how much sound you want to get through the telecoil. Mine is 100%, when it's turned on. But you can do 50/50, 75/25, 90/10....whatever. 

Sound and Silence Part I: How I Lost My Hearing

Saturday was World Hearing Day, so I showed a few shots of my Bionic Ear on instagram. Some people were shocked to see I had one! So I decided it was time to do a little updated series here about why I have one, how I got it, how I like it, and what life is like with one. 

I was born with normal hearing. 

Actually, I was born with really great hearing. My mom used to get irritated because I'd hear her whispering things to dad in the next room and yell, hey, I want to hear about that! 

As a singer, and a musician, your hearing is important. Obviously. A lot of my voice lessons involved listening. Intervals, pitch-matching, etc; all of that is a huge part of the musical art. 

In college, people started to notice that I wasn't hearing them when they were talking to me. Now, some of that was just that I tend to get really absorbed in things--a book, something I'm writing. But people would call my name, and I wouldn't answer. 

I went to the audiologist at Nationwide Children's, and I did have some hearing loss. Not a lot, and probably not enough for hearing aids to help. But it was showing up on the hearing tests. OK. I just shrugged and went on with my life. 

In between 2003-2005 (pre-transplant), I was on a lot of drugs. Hard core, IV meds, in order to keep me alive and breathing. Some of these were ototoxic--meaning they killed the hair cells in my ears, the hairs that conduct sound to the cochlea. Without these hair cells, you don't hear. 

(Here's a brief explanation: 

When you are exposed to loud music or noise, it is your hair cells which are damaged. Hearing loss occurs because loud sounds are really just large pressure waves (like when you stand next to a subwoofer and can "feel" the bass). These large pressure waves bend the stereocilia too far, sometimes to the point where they are damaged. This kills the hair cell. Since cochlear hair cells can not grow back, this manifests as a permanent hearing loss.) 

In my case, it wasn't loud noises. It was the medication. Once hair cells are gone, they do not grow back. They are gone forever. 

And the more I used these drugs, the more hair cells died, in both ears. 

By the time of my transplant, my hearing had gotten worse, and we were starting to think about hearing aids. I was fitted with my first pair soon after transplant. Hearing aids are not covered by insurance. I needed the most powerful kind, the behind-the-ear hearing aids, and they were fit to my ear shape. 

They were also a pain in the butt. 

Hearing aids just magnify sound. It's like turning up the volume on everything. But it's everything. It's not discriminate. Things like pages turning were incredibly loud. In a crowded room, I couldn't focus on one sound. Everything came in, all the time. 

The other problem is that hearing aids break. The outer ear part would separate from the part that went in my ear. I was constantly trying to put them back together with tape! 

In 2007-2008, I got sick again--and more ototoxic meds. Now the hearing aids weren't really helping at all. It was time to think about cochlear implants. 

I didn't like this idea. One, I didn't like the idea of a magnet in my head. I didn't like that it would take any residual hearing away from the ear that had the CI. I didn't like the idea of surgery and weirdness. 

But eventually it got to the point where it hurt to hear. The organ at church was painful. Listening to people was awful. I didn't like to go to crowded places. I couldn't go to the movies, and I love the movies. 

That's when we decided it was time for a CI. 

A cochlear implant is vastly different than a hearing aid. A hearing aid, as I said above, just amplifies sound. A CI helps my brain decipher and understand the sound. It directly stimulates the auditory nerve, so they bypass all my damaged equipment and go right to the source. 

I had to have some tests done: you can't have a CI unless you have a certain amount of hearing loss. You need to have moderate to profound loss to qualify for it. Insurance does pay for a CI and the surgery.* I had a CT scan and MRI** on my head, to make sure they could implant the magnet, as well as  more hearing tests, to determine the extent of my hearing loss, and also, which ear would receive the implant (I didn't get bilateral CIs. More on that next.). My right ear has slightly more hearing than the left, so the left ear was the "winner", and has the CI. 

Surgery was scheduled for May of 2008. 

In the next installment, I'll talk about surgery, recovery, and how the CI works. 

* More about insurance coverage in the upcoming installments. 

**Last MRI ever, because, with a magnet in my head, they're contraindicated from here on out. Yay!