New Member Introducing Myself

[talkingdeafgirl]

Hi! I’m new here. I thought of introducing myself and tell you a bit of my background.
Here it goes…

Around 30 years ago, when I was born, everything looked fine to my parents – I was a bright and healthy baby and so was a statement from the attending hospital doctor.

But during my neonatal months, when my utterances were just monosyllables and not perfect speech (sounds/words), my parents were concerned.

However, everybody around me from family, friends, to the pediatrician advised my parents that I was just as a case of a “late talker”.

Even an impedance audiometry at 21/2 years showed normal hearing, when my parents worried too much before the doctors.

But when I wouldn’t talk normally at 3 years, my parents were really alarmed, they consulted a pediatrician at Mass General Hospital in Boston who recommended a BERA test.

And then came the shock for my parents – they learnt that I was born with congenital binaural sensori-neural profound hearing loss – in other words I was just short of totally deaf.

My parents immediately got me a pair of analog BTEs (digital hearing aids weren’t available then) and my mother took me to a speech therapist to start ‘auditory-verbal lessons’.

My mom and I persevered – often struggled for months and months to perfect my speech and meanwhile I was mainstreamed into a regular private school from the beginning.

Later I went to an art college and specialized in computer graphics and graduated in BFA with honors.

After college I worked as a graphic designer in a publication house and later on as a graphic analyst in a multi-specialty law firm. I have also been a design consultant for some time and thus I gathered some professional experience in my field.

Currently I am working full-time as a freelance artist with occasional graphic design projects. I set up my own website where you can purchase prints or merchandise with artworks inspired by my own past and present personal experiences, travels and so on.

Yes, I’m a devotee. And looking to make friendships here and hopefully get a partner too. I was always attracted to disabled men - those who limps a bit or a lot, wearing leg braces and amputees esp. the AK or BK etc... And I'm open to other disabilities also.

[euroquad]

Welcome 😀Great intro and I hope you find here what you are looking for 😀

[talkingdeafgirl]

Jan 13, 2024 23:52:58 GMT -5 euroquad said:

Welcome 😀Great intro and I hope you find here what you are looking for 😀

Thank you so much! 😀

[cygnus]

Welcome!

[joffy]

Wow! You have done amazingly well despite having the odds against you. How is your experience with hearing aids? My last two pair keeps breaking and we really don't know why.

[talkingdeafgirl]

Jan 14, 2024 0:44:54 GMT -5 cygnus said:

Welcome!

Thank you! 🙂

[talkingdeafgirl]

Jan 14, 2024 2:14:07 GMT -5 joffy said:

Wow! You have done amazingly well despite having the odds against you. How is your experience with hearing aids? My last two pair keeps breaking and we really don't know why.

Thank you for your kind words Joffy. 🙂 I have good experience with my hearing aids esp the digital BTEs and the RICs. As you know from the my introduction, I have been wearing them all my life and the digital ones for the last 20 years.
Could you be more specific with the issues you are facing with.
And what type and brand of HAs are you using?

You can message me anytime, and I’ll can tell you the solutions, if not, I can find out more and let you know then. 🙂

[anthonyg]

Welcome!

[talkingdeafgirl]

Jan 14, 2024 11:50:08 GMT -5 anthonyg said:

Welcome!

Thanks! 🙂

[joffy]

Jan 14, 2024 3:16:22 GMT -5 talkingdeafgirl said:

Jan 14, 2024 2:14:07 GMT -5 joffy said:

Wow! You have done amazingly well despite having the odds against you. How is your experience with hearing aids? My last two pair keeps breaking and we really don't know why.

Thank you for your kind words Joffy. 🙂 I have good experience with my hearing aids esp the digital BTEs and the RICs. As you know from the my introduction, I have been wearing them all my life and the digital ones for the last 20 years.
Could you be more specific with the issues you are facing with.
And what type and brand of HAs are you using?

You can message me anytime, and I’ll can tell you the solutions, if not, I can find out more and let you know then. 🙂

Took a while but it looks like I have the Signia Insio 5nx, the problem I've is that the sound just gets super low after like a month and no amount of cleaning or change of filters fixes this so we have to send it in for repairs very frequently. This didn't happen in the past when they were called Siemens so I don't know if the quality of the components has changed or it's something else.

Thank you very much for helping me out

[talkingdeafgirl]

Jan 15, 2024 1:49:35 GMT -5 joffy said:

Jan 14, 2024 3:16:22 GMT -5 talkingdeafgirl said:

Thank you for your kind words Joffy. 🙂 I have good experience with my hearing aids esp the digital BTEs and the RICs. As you know from the my introduction, I have been wearing them all my life and the digital ones for the last 20 years.
Could you be more specific with the issues you are facing with.
And what type and brand of HAs are you using?

You can message me anytime, and I’ll can tell you the solutions, if not, I can find out more and let you know then. 🙂

Took a while but it looks like I have the Signia Insio 5nx, the problem I've is that the sound just gets super low after like a month and no amount of cleaning or change of filters fixes this so we have to send it in for repairs very frequently. This didn't happen in the past when they were called Siemens so I don't know if the quality of the components has changed or it's something else.

Thank you very much for helping me out

Looks like you are using a CIC or ITC hearing aid.

They are highly prone to wax buildups and more prone to develop problems which incurs repeated repairs as compared to BTEs or RICs. And Siemens were good once upon a time, IDK about its current status, but today's the world's leading brand is Phonak. So you can give it a try. BTW, I used to wear Siemens before and currently I'm using Phonak for the last 14 years or so. I never had problems with the Phonak RICs.

[joffy]

Jan 15, 2024 6:47:16 GMT -5 talkingdeafgirl said:

Jan 15, 2024 1:49:35 GMT -5 joffy said:

Took a while but it looks like I have the Signia Insio 5nx, the problem I've is that the sound just gets super low after like a month and no amount of cleaning or change of filters fixes this so we have to send it in for repairs very frequently. This didn't happen in the past when they were called Siemens so I don't know if the quality of the components has changed or it's something else.

Thank you very much for helping me out

Looks like you are using a CIC or ITC hearing aid.

They are highly prone to wax buildups and more prone to develop problems which incurs repeated repairs as compared to BTEs or RICs. And Siemens were good once upon a time, IDK about its current status, but today's the world's leading brand is Phonak. So you can give it a try. BTW, I used to wear Siemens before and currently I'm using Phonak for the last 14 years or so. I never had problems with the Phonak RICs.

As I live in Denmark and got bad enough hearing I get free hearing aids every 6 years or so which is obviously pretty awesome but it also means that I have to wait a few years to get new ones. May I see yours so I know what to look for next time?

[talkingdeafgirl]

Jan 15, 2024 10:56:20 GMT -5 joffy said:

Jan 15, 2024 6:47:16 GMT -5 talkingdeafgirl said:

Looks like you are using a CIC or ITC hearing aid.

They are highly prone to wax buildups and more prone to develop problems which incurs repeated repairs as compared to BTEs or RICs. And Siemens were good once upon a time, IDK about its current status, but today's the world's leading brand is Phonak. So you can give it a try. BTW, I used to wear Siemens before and currently I'm using Phonak for the last 14 years or so. I never had problems with the Phonak RICs.

As I live in Denmark and got bad enough hearing I get free hearing aids every 6 years or so which is obviously pretty awesome but it also means that I have to wait a few years to get new ones. May I see yours so I know what to look for next time?

It depends on what type of hearing loss you have, generally the audiologist will recommend the types and models based on your latest audiograms. These RICs covers mild to severe-profound loss. 

These are the Phonak Lumity RICs (Receiver in Canal) - the latest ones which I got 6 months back. And they are pretty good especially with natural sounds and more importantly the human speech.

[joffy]

Jan 15, 2024 12:31:05 GMT -5 talkingdeafgirl said:

Jan 15, 2024 10:56:20 GMT -5 joffy said:

As I live in Denmark and got bad enough hearing I get free hearing aids every 6 years or so which is obviously pretty awesome but it also means that I have to wait a few years to get new ones. May I see yours so I know what to look for next time?

It depends on what type of hearing loss you have, generally the audiologist will recommend the types and models based on your latest audiograms. These RICs covers mild to severe-profound loss. 

These are the Phonak Lumity RICs (Receiver in Canal) - the latest ones which I got 6 months back. And they are pretty good especially with natural sounds and more importantly the human speech.

View Attachment

I've always just had the same kind with the only difference being the sizes, my hearing has always been around 50% so there should be some options for me.

Thank you very much for all the help

[Dani]

Welcome to PD and thanks for the introduction!