Today marks 4 months and 4 days since the surgery, and 3 months and 4 days since the day of activation.
I haven’t written in over a month because there hasn’t been much to report on. My progress with the implant is steady. As time goes on, I find I like it more and more, and I am noticing more sounds. The A/V Therapist, Tami, is determined to get me talking on the phone. At first I wasn’t sure if this would be possible, but I am starting to be able to make more sense of phone conversations. I still need a cue of some sort though.
I still notice that there are a few sounds that I hear with my hearing aid, when it’s on, that I don’t with my implant. It’s just not picking it up.
Overall, I think I am just too impatient. I want to make faster progress than I am, even if apparently I am already making incredibly fast progress. I just want to get to the level where I can hear with it as well as I could with my hearing aid. I miss talking on the phone and my family, including my husband, misses talking on the phone with me. I tried with my hearing aid, but my brain is just already working so hard, it’s not worth the pain of trying to figure it all out.
The last time I went in for a mapping, Dr. Wolfe gave me the same program on all three slots, but different volume levels. That was over a month ago, and I’ve found that I haven’t progressed to the new volume levels as quickly as I did before. I still have to start the day out on the lowest one, then I move to the middle one later, and then only occasionally do I find that I need to move to the third one. If I do it before I’m ready, everything is too loud.
I also have a sneaking suspicion that the implant doesn’t sound as clear as it did before the last mapping, even with the new volume settings… I can’t tell if it’s in my head or not. It just doesn’t seem as “easy” to hear with it as it did before. Shortly after the mapping I kept thinking it would improve as it always did, and to a degree it did improve, but it doesn’t seem to be as good as before. Maybe it’s just in my head.
My main complaint with the implant now is the pain that head is in after a day of wearing the outer parts. The part under the magnet is tender, and the part that the processor hangs on is sore. It’s getting to be annoying, my ear does not seem to be toughening up to it at all.
Other than that, everything is going great!
