I thought I was going to write in my journal tonight and I realized I filled it up last week and don’t have another. So I am writing here. I just experienced Cochlear Implant surgery. I have had challenged hearing for more than thirty five years. I think my hearing loss started at a Sly and the Family Stone rock concert when I was seventeen. I got pushed up against a giant speaker and have had really loud ringing in my ears ever since. I started to lose my hearing in my mid thirties. I got hearing aids in my forties rejected them and then tried again successfully twenty years ago in my fifties. My hearing loss has progressed a great deal in the last year. It is now considered a profound level of hearing loss in both ears. Hearing aids are really helpful and my hearing aid technicians are a combination of mad scientist and angel. I am grateful.
I have learned to read lips very skillfully and now I rely on lip reading for about 90 percent of my hearing. I am a psychotherapist. My job is perfect for me because I am in a small room with one or two other people staring at their mouths and listening intently. I am extremely blessed that I have gotten to do the work that I love in the midst of my disability. I think my hearing loss has helped me to be more compassionate toward others challenges. As my outer hearing has deteriorated, my inner hearing has developed more and more. I am able to access my intuition through inner listening and have many wise guides. My clients are very patient if I need them to repeat themselves. Holding other people in love through my work for forty years has been one of the greatest gifts of my lifetime.
My other greatest gift is my daughter. She has had to navigate my hearing loss all of her life. I know it has been challenging for her. She came out from Chicago to be with me for my surgery. I am so lucky to have this talented loving creative evolved being to share my journey with.
In the last year I have begun to seriously contemplate Cochlear implant surgery. The clarity of my being able to understand speech has gotten steadily worse in the last year. I was struggling in all areas of my life and was mostly unable to understand conversations unless I could read the persons lips. I had withdrawn from almost all socializing and felt more and more isolated. I am very active and my hearing challenges created a great deal of exhaustion. My close people were understanding and I knew communicating with me was getting more difficult for all of them.
I am so grateful, in a way, that my hearing loss was bad enough that I qualified to be a candidate for a Cochlear implant. In the year before the surgery I interviewed four mentors about their experiences living with the device. Their stories were all different. Each one encouraged me to move forward based on their own positive experiences. After each conversation I felt less and less afraid. I was doing counseling myself as a client and did a lot of work experiencing and releasing my fears. The more I felt my fear the more space there was within me for excitement.
My surgery was three days ago. I so appreciate that my sister and my daughter were with me. The nurses and the doctors were so helpful. My surgeon was skillful, direct and kind. I was very afraid and closed my eyes and breathed deeply to prepare myself for the surgery. The operation implanting the Cochlear implant into my head took two hours. After coming out of anesthesia I was the most drugged dizzy and nauseous I’ve ever felt. I got to go home and sleep it off for four hours.
As the days have gone by I am moving very slowly, taking lots of meds, and experimenting with how much or little I can do to keep the nausea, dizziness and pain at bay. I can’t lift anything over ten pounds or bend over for several weeks. After the wound heals in two weeks my Cochlear implant will be activated and I will learn to hear in a whole new way.
I will write again after the Cochlear Implant activation. Right now I have one hearing aid and lip reading. I am managing well. I feel strong and confident and trust that I will be OK whatever happens. Going through this procedure has taught me a lot about my own capabilities. Going through with surgery has helped me to trust myself and my vibrantly healthy body and how resilient I am. A great deal of self doubt has melted away because now I am on the other side of the operation I was so afraid of for so long.
Thank you for listening.
