Going Live

you're going to want to view this in the "sidebar" mode, in order to see the line of pictures of the healing progress. the link to side bar mode should be just above this and slightly to the left :D

fun fact about me that i think i've thrown on here before: i'm hearing impaired! i have been completely deaf in my left ear for as long as i can remember. we found out when i was 8 and the cause is unknown, though the best theory they have is that my bones and nerves didn't grow with the rest of me. none of those things are connected. so i have a fully functional inner ear, but you could say that i don't have an extension cord long enough to reach the outlet :)

there's this awesome piece of technology called a BAHA. it stands for bone anchored hearing aid. it works by implanting a titanium screw in your skull in the bone behind your ear. that screw has a snap attachment on the end that sticks out of your head and you snap a processor onto it. that processor takes in sound and vibrates it into your skull, which in turn vibrates the sound to your other ear. sort of like a tuning fork, as it were. so you hear things on your deaf side through your hearing ear.

pretty amazing, huh!?

well, i've known about this particular device since one of my annual hearing tests in college. my insurance at the time wouldn't even cover a hearing aid (that's actually very common by the way. you can get viagra, but not hearing aids, through most insurance. apparently sex is necessary to every day living, but not hearing. priorities!). then i got married and military insurance DOES cover the hearing aid! aaaaaaah!!!!!! i was sort of deadlocked in the process at our first base because of a lack of ENTs in the area, specifically any who knew what a BAHA was or how to do the surgery.

then i got pregnant. in addition to not being able to have surgery whilst incubating, pregnancy itself can change your hearing. so i would have to start from square 0 after jp was born.

well, jp came. i started the process while we were trying for our second baby, just in case it took us some time to get pregnant. well, it didn't take much time at all! so it was back to the beginning again!

finally, at the end of november of 2011, i got my hearing test and my referral to the ENT to determine if i was a candidate.

by now i had been waiting 6 years. really, i had been waiting for 20 years, but i didn't even know i could change my life until 6 years ago.

there was a "test" piece, a metal headband with the processor attached that presses the processor into your bone to give you an idea of what kind of sound you may gain. it's a faint shadow of the sound you get with the real abutment because it has to fight through skin, tissue, muscle, nerve, etc.

but it worked. i could hear.

it was the strangest thing. i kept thinking jp was getting into things he should not while i was making breakfast or putting away laundry, because he was being so loud and so indiscreet! but he wasn't doing anything odd. it was just that i couldn't always hear the clicks, slides, bangs, footsteps and swishes of his every day play when i was in other rooms because walls muted sounds and i was carrying dead weight on one side.

i have no way to describe the difference. the best i can come up with is just "more". maybe richer. instead of a 6 string guitar, a 12 string. or instead of a quartet, a full orchestra, playing at the same volume as before, but with dozens more instruments.

and i begged them to schedule the fastest surgery date i could get. it was nearly a month later, which seemed like an eternity and a millisecond all at once. the holidays did me a giant favor in passing time and before i knew it surgery day arrived.

i did it with a local numbing and no sedation (a lot like dental surgery, but on your skull..... sooo..... maybe not like dental surgery haha!) and was out of the hospital within an hour of getting out of surgery.

it's a 6 week-3 month wait to get your processor, depending on how well/quickly you heal.

i heal like wolverine. no lie.

at my 3 week check up the ENT said that it was healing so well we could probably attach it now, but it would be best to wait and make sure the thing is REALLY solid so it doesn't get shaken loose and fall out.

i agree. once this is in, i sincerely doubt i'm going to want to go another 6 weeks without it, ever again.

i will be able to sit shot gun in a car and hear the passenger without turning my head. i can potentially go to movies with stereo and be able to catch what's going on. i can walk on whatever side of people i like. i can read books to my kids, jp on the left, calvin on the right, and i will be able to hear them both talk to me. the list goes on. i'll never be able to go back.

i can wait 3 more weeks for years of uninterrupted hearing.

so there's the picture slideshow of my healing process, from day 0 to right before i got the processor.

sorry if this somehow makes ya queasy! i actually don't think it's bad at all! i was really impressed with how well it healed up and how gross it didn't look, especially compared to some other sites i've seen.


and here's the box!!




there aren't many ways i can go about describing what this day has been like. i got the processor at 10am and i don't think my life will ever be the same. that sounds so cliche, but it's true.

my mom was kind enough to shoot a video of me listening to surround sound for the first time so that e could see it. i asked my folks which movies were good for surround sound, and their first pick was armageddon.

turns out armageddon is $10 to rent on amazon instant video!!! WHAT THE!!? ridiculous.

so we went with pick #2, top gun :D  here it is!

as an added bonus, there's a video of my parents! the BAHA processor kit comes with a little piece of plastic (i think? it may be something else) that the processor can be placed inside, and then pressed to your forehead so you can hear sound the way a BAHA user hears sound (sort of-- a BAHA implant is much clearer!). today is my dad's birthday, so i would say in general, this was a pretty cool gift :) i think he'd agree!