What it is like between two worlds with CI'S

What is like between two worlds. When you're between two worlds. The hearing world and the deaf world. The hearing world is sometimes gets frustrating, it gets mad with one who wears a hearing aid or just has trouble hearing but.... it is sometimes asked. "You have a hearing aid? Why don't you turn it up? And then they shout and say,"well, I have to shout for you to hear me" but yet we tried to tell them to look at me! Don't turn your head, don't look down..... just look straight at me so I can read your lips.

And there's times we just want to break down and cry, and keeps saying to ourselves,"why can't people understand?"It's not that we don't want to hear them, we do. It would be nice if people from the hearing world could just take a moment and put themselves in our shoes and think about how we feel. Like I said on hearing journey, people take their hearing are granted and there's times I've wished that they could see that before hearing loss happens to them. Some of us have lost our hearing from allergic reactions, sudden deafness, slow losing their hearing, some were born that way, some have lost their hearing from her car wreck. And so on.

Like the teacher that I did a speech for was telling me. When she was younger in her teen years, the doctors had told her she needed to protect her hearing in the years to come she will lose it and she said I told the doctors not need but now she wished she had h protected er ears.

During that time that I was wearing a hearing aid, I was trying to fit in to the world. The best I can to learn sign language. I was trying to understand them if they were trying to understand me and tell them that I was hard of hearing and that I did know very little sign to help me. But as they knew I'll wore a hearing aid. They said you are a hearing person, and I told them yes. Let on hard of hearing and that I had two use sign language, and lip reading to understand what people are saying. And they said okay.

When I got my first CI. I was really nervous on way is going to be like. I remember when I first met Jennifer Thorpe. She was so patient and understanding, and she knew exactly how I felt. I was so excited about seeing her that I was talking really fast. I realized that I was talking to fast. She was telling me about the implants and how they work. She even put a fork on her head where the CI magnet is, so it stuck for he boys to see. And this was in a restaurant. She had us all laughing and made us feel wanted.

She wasn't there the day I had surgery and she and her daughter Katie came into the recovery room and gave the boy's cookies. She let me know that everything must be okay, But it's going to take time and a lot of hard work. When I first got my CI turned on it was music to my ears. I was so excited that day because I could hear her for the first time after 48 years. My son was with me that day. The audiologist and Jeremy and I were laughing so hard that tears were flowing down our faces. When I got my second CI . My husband was with me that day and he had tears rolling down his face when I heard his words and understood every word.

A cochlear implant is a blessing in that they make lives better through which we can have a normal happy life. To me it's a gift and advanced bionics has given me and thousands of others the ability to have happiness in hearing. I'm able to enjoy my music, to be on the phone , and to be able to understand people in a conversation over the phone and not even knowing that I am hard of hearing. Just to be able to feel like I'm welcomed into the hearing world, but yet between two worlds. The reason why is that a bad is the night, I am in the deaf world in total silence, very lonely world, very quiet and scary, there are times I'm worried if there will be a big fire or someone breaks in, in many other things! Every morning I tell my husband and my children thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to hear them again by that many had the surgeries. I do not know what I would do without my CI'S. I am so grateful to have online friends like Kim, Eric, Sam, Evelyn, Sylvia, and Jennifer and so many others that I have met when I first came to hearing journey. I hope this can help others that are going through the hardships that we all have with our hearing on chat and on the forum