Family Fun?

Some families play charades because it's a fun game the whole family can enjoy. My family play charades because we have no other choice.

 In earlier posts I've mentioned the unnatural need of all my family members to want to speak to me while I'm in the shower or bath. I have young children, I haven't washed in peace for over ten years.

Anyway, I was having a lovely relaxing bath this evening and in jumps the youngest to wash himself. I spent the next twenty minutes trying to guess what he was trying to tell me while he spelled out words in the air, made gestures, hand signals and tried mouthing the words very slowly. I thought he was saying 'a mouse ate my pants in the spa' but it ended up being 'when is the Stars wars movie out?' Hmmmm.

Then the other kid comes in. He put some more thought into his routine and handed me a towel, pointed to my hands and made a rubbing gesture with his (dry your hands) and then stuck his hair in my face (feel my hair, I need more conditioner).

Then the husband walks in, chatting away. At that point I got out of the bath. Most exhausting bath I've ever had!

New Year Decisions

It's nearly time for me to return to work for the new year. I've had a bit more time off than usual due to my abdominal surgery but after the kids return to school next week, I'll be back to work the week after.

I have a few decisions to make regarding my work this year. I normally have two jobs, one as a full time lecturer in Education and another as a relief teacher with children with special needs and early childhood children. I'm not sure how I'll go lecturing as I haven't attempted to take a class since going deaf. Now that I have the cochlear implant, lecturing will be easier, obviously, but I'm not sure it will be the same. I'm yet to discover the strategies I'll have to employ to get the job done.

My other job as a relief teacher is a bit tricky. In WA, relief teachers have to work a minimum number of days each year in the state system to maintain state registration. The school where I work with children with special needs in a state school. The school where I teach early childhood students is a private school and I don't have to have state registration to work there. This is my problem. I really don't think I can continue to teach in early childhood. The classrooms are noisy places and young children have quiet voices and tend to mumble. No really, most young children do not speak clearly and loudly, they mumble their words and some even hang their heads while talking. They don't know how to talk to adults. Clearly, I can't teach hearing children whom I can't hear.

Anyway, the other classroom in which I teach, in special needs, has only five students and most are non-verbal. This is a bonus as a non-verbal child doesn't speak and therefore I don't have to worry about hearing them. The education assistants (teacher aides) however do speak and it is vitally important to be able to communicate with them. My other issue is that last year I heard the education assitants talking about another teacher who was hard of hearing in a, how should I say, not very nice way. Now I'm faced with returning to teach in this classroom as a deaf teacher knowing full well how the education assitants feel about deaf teachers!!

My other problem is that schools ring for relief teachers. I can't take a phone call at the moment so how do they call me for work????

What do I do?

Give up relief teaching (which I love) and therefore my teaching registration (that I've worked hard to keep) and also valuable teaching experience that contributes significantly to my lecturing job? Do I have another option?  I don't know that I do ............................

The Hairdressers

One activity that is difficult when wearing a cochlear implant is going to the hairdressers. Since I went deaf in August 2011 I haven't been to the hairdressers. Yes, that's six months. No, I haven't let myself go. My husband has been giving me a regular trim (he's a trained hairdresser) and my kind sister-in-law (also a trained hairdresser) has been putting a natural colour through my hair. For the new year though, I felt I needed to bite the bullet and have a make-over so I booked myself in to the hairdressers for the full works. I knew that once I had the colour dye put on my hair I would have to take off my cochlear implant and the rest of the appointment (3 hours) I would be deaf. I was sure to tell the hairdresser everything I wanted before I took the CI off!
I had to start lip reading again and it was a challenge because I was looking in the mirror, reflection lip reading!
When the hairdresser had cut my hair and dried it, I put my CI back on while she styled my hair. I just had to keep an eye on those hot tongs to make sure she didn't melt my magnet. Whenever she ran the comb through my hair it would catch on my wire and pull the CI off.
We both survived the experience and and I was able to tick another thing off my "Deaf To Do List". I'm slowly ticking them all off and also crossing out the things that I can never do again (go through a fast food drive-thru for example!). x

Audi

Another audi appointment yesterday. She reported that I'm hearing soft sounds better than ever which is very useful during conversations. My processing of loud sounds has not changed that much. I'm nearly at the three month mark since having the CI turned on so I can expect more changes in the quality of sound that I hear for another nine months yet. In a few months I'll be having a hearing test to see how well my brain is processing sounds using the CI. This will be interesting.
I had to go to the shops today for a few things so I had a quick shower, dressed, dried my hair and left the house. I started up the car and had a feeling I'd forgotten something. I checked for my sunglasses, purse, mobile phone, all there, and then suddenly I remembered - my CI!!! Could have been a problem in the shops, "sorry, I've left my ear at home so I can't hear you".

Where would we be without support?

In my earlier posts I mentioned how wonderful and supportive my work colleagues have been since I went deaf in August. Yesterday, I was short listed for a training award and the person who nominated me for the award was one of my colleagues. The interview panel sent me a copy of the nomination she wrote and I was so touched that she mentioned how I'd continued to work on a big project while going through the trauma of going deaf and having the CI surgery. I'm sure anyone in my postion would do the same but it's so nice to be recognised. So, thank you Jo, your continued support means the world to me. x

Good Clear Sounds

Good clear sounds today, well, better sounds anyway. It always sounds robotic but I remind myself that I am using a computer to hear so that is to be expected. I have another tune-up this week (tomorrow) so I'm really looking forward to seeing what my progress looks like on my auditory maps. These show me how my range of sound are increasing over the weeks/months. It's really interesting. I can now hear about half of what a hearing person hears in their one ear, so a 1/4 overall of what a hearing person hears. This doesn't sound like much but to a deaf person who started with about 5% distorted residual hearing, it's amazing.
On a side note, I'm recovering well from my recent abdominal surgery. I feel like I've had to start over twice in the last six months! While I'm usually an active person, having the two surgeries so close together has slowed me down and I'm keen to get moving again. I have to wait a whole six weeks before I can run again. Oh well, I've done it before, I'll do again (hopefully for the last time in a while).

Five Months

It's been five months since going deaf. Sometimes, I still can't believe it. I'll wake up in the morning and think "holy crap, I'm actually deaf and this will last forever". My hearing can't get any worse as it's already as bad as it gets. It's so final; there is no treatment like an illness, no magic cure (although you could argue that the CI is a cure but, not really), no special medicine, this is it. For the rest of my life I will listen to people talk via an artificial device attached to my skull. It's a fairly major "holy crap" moment.

I've taught myself to shake these thoughts as quickly as possible, it would be too easy to dwell on what I've lost instead of thinking about what I've still got. xx