No Big News

Nope, don't have any big news. Things have taken on a more "airy" sound. The airiness has not been helpful. I don't know if it's just part of the changes or what. I have noticed more sounds lately though. My car has lots of noises!! I keep hearing the blinker more and more. I've heard the ding if you don't have your seat belt on and the dings for leaving the keys in the ignition. Also, the beeping when I hit the button to lock and unlock the doors. Who knew the car was so noisy!!??!!

I was out shopping one day and realized I heard other people talking to each other. I still can't tell what they were saying, but I can hear them talking. I also noticed I can hear Romy talking. She's never made it through before, but now I'm picking her up.

The cats continue to come through loud and clear. I also heard Rick squirting and sniffing his nasal spray! Isn't that something that everybody is just dying to hear!!

I thought I would post some pictures to show what the processor looks like for those who haven't seen one. Here it is sitting on my ear. You can't see the magnet part.




I've moved my hair so you can see the microphone that curls around to the front of my ear and also the magnetic part that sticks to my head.



Here's the whole outfit. If you look, you can tell the processor is actually 3 parts. The part that curls around is the t-mic - that picks up the sound. The middle part is the processor and then the bottom part is the battery. The round part over to the side is the head piece. That contains the magnet and is where all the sound info passes through my skin into the implant.


Just needed to throw in a cute picture of the girls!! You can tell they are saying cheeeese!!! I bought them these cute little overalls and they had to come over to model for me!

All Systems Go!!!

Yesterday was my 2 week appointment with Meg. It is hard to believe that it has only been 2 weeks. It seems like I've had this thing FOREVER!! I think that's why, at times, it seems like I haven't come very far. I think it's because I'm so focused on it all the time......seeing what I hear, what I don't hear, how things sound, listening for the "dialing" effect, on and on and on. That makes time really drag out.

The doctor has started me on a diuretic to see if that helps with the dialing effect. They think it may be fluid. Don't know for sure. So, I'm trying this to see if it helps. If so, great!! If not, we'll try something else!

Meg tweaked my programs some more. She also ran another impedance test and some of the numbers are rising. They are still plenty low, but they have gone up a little since the last test -- 2 weeks ago. She has no clue why this is happening. She's going to talk to the AB people and see if they have any ideas. I think I'm going to be a real challenging case...... I seem to have a lot of issues!! :-) At least I'll keep these people on their toes!! Make them earn their money!!

She ran another test to see how the cochlea and nerve were responding and that all looked good. It's just weird some of the things they can test!! We re-did a couple of simple tests that she did the first day she hooked me up. She shows me a paper with 6 words on it. She goes over the words (rainbow, toothpaste, baseball, bluebird, hot dog, ice cream), then covers her face and I have to tell her which word she's saying. The day of my hook up, I got none. Rick thinks I got 2. Either 0 or 2.......it was bad. Yesterday I got 6 of 7! Now, I'm not actually hearing the real words, but I'm picking up enough to guess at what she's saying. Then she did another one that was sounds......ooooooo, eeeeee, mmmmm, sssss, sh, aaaaa......I got 4 of 6 on that one. Again -- I got none the first time. Also, the first time I didn't even hear the ssss or sh. Yesterday, I could probably hear those the best. Snappy!!! She is mighty impressed. I guess it doesn't take much to thrill her!! NEXT, she put me in the sound booth where they do the normal hearing tests. She just ran some sounds through the speaker -- I didn't have on the ear phones. They were soft sounds.....Rick said it was kind of like white noise.....and very soft. This test is the one that really blew me away!! I barely heard them, but heard something. Then she showed me the chart. On the test pre-CI, the lowest tone that I heard was somewhat below the normal hearing line, the next tone dropped farther down, the next one was way down, then beyond that, it was off the chart.....I didn't hear anything at all. The sounds from yesterday were all around the normal hearing range!! These are sounds that I could not hear before. That was too wild!!! I mean, really blew me away!!! She says I am doing great, right on target and the progress I have made is HUGE!! WHOOOPEEE!!!!

I go back to see her in 3 weeks. This will be right before we head off to Vegas. Oh man....I LOVE Vegas!!!! Anyway, she wants to see me before we go in case we need to tweak the programs some. Also, she'll give me a Vegas program. I'm thinking SNAAAPPPYY!! She'll take out some of the high pitches.....kind of a noise reduction, so hopefully all the noise won't kill my ear! As long as I hear that DING DING DING when I win-----that's all I need!!!!!

I am starting to be able to tell some differences in sounds. It's still mostly just noise, but I can tell some differences. At work this morning, I was at the microwave heating water for some tea..... and I guess, since she changed my programs, things were pretty loud. The microwave was a roar, but I heard somebody come in the door and realized what it was. Then I heard the bell ding on the microwave. I don't think I've noticed all of that before!! It's so cool!!

This evening I was deleting phone numbers off of our caller id and heard the beep of the buttons come through loud and clear! Snappy again!!! So............things............they are a-changin'!!!!

It's all very exciting and pretty wild when I think about it! I have been very blessed!!!

Happy Easter!!

I hope everyone is having a blessed Easter!! We've had a good day, but I'm telling you....it is frigid!! What happened to spring?? It was 80 degrees just a week ago!! I'm not liking this at all.

I feel I had my own Easter miracle last night. We stopped to visit a friend after being out and about yesterday afternoon. I had just been thinking how things didn't seem to be changing very much. I do see little differences, but nothing dramatic. I know I have to be patient and these things take lots of time. I also have to remind myself that I've only been "online" for less than 2 weeks. I am very patient, but it's nice to see some progress every now and then. :-)

DeAnne was asking how things were, what I was hearing, about the changes and all that. I told her the latest. A little while later, we were standing in the kitchen continuing to chat away, when I realized that things had really changed while we were standing there!! That was too wild!!! I still can't understand speech, but I feel like I took a big step closer!! I'm getting more sound, some lower sounds, it's almost like the sounds are being stretched out and warbley! I know that makes no sense to you......it doesn't make much sense to me either!! But I really don't know how to explain what I'm hearing. It reminds me of the bad guy on tv -- the kidnapper who calls about the ransom and is talking through a synthesizer!! That's the best I can do!!

Some things sound a little more normal. Well, not quite normal, but better than they were. It's not all high pitched squealing. As I sit here typing, the keys sound more clackety and not high pitched beeping. Our mouse has a roller thing that you can turn and scroll down a page....well I hear each click that it makes and as I scroll quickly, it has a "roller" sound! For me...that's pretty exciting!! People's voices are still weird, but I can tell that I'm getting closer to the time when I'll be able to make out some words. It's really a big change from what I was hearing!!! Wheeeeeeee!!!

We finally did our taxes today. Nothing like waiting till the last minute!! Oh heck -- we actually still have a week --- why the big rush!???!

By the way, Rick has decided to take up blogging! I've read his first post and I'm not quite sure who he's talking about!!! I'm going to have to keep an eye on him!! He's at: http://www.bionicnut.blogspot.com/ He said that I'm the "fruit" and he's the "nut". Well, we ALL know he's a litte nutty!! Enough said.

Just Checking In

I thought I would write a smidge since it's been a few days. I was going to check in a couple of days ago, but we had some big ugly storms pass through so I wasn't on the computer. Then last night we had dinner at Cynthia's. We all brought part of the meal and let me just say, it was scrumptious!!! Mom made french fried chicken and green beans. I took corn and stuffed eggs. Cynthia made smashed potatoes and strawberry shortcake. We were eating high on the hog!! Oh my!!!!

There's not been any big changes, but still having little ones. Any change is nice!! I'm still noticing small changes in the way things sound. I'm also hearing more things. So far I've heard 3 of the kitties talking -- Sylvester, Scarlet and Baxter. I've not heard Lucy. But she doesn't talk a whole lot. She's a loner. Scarlet is the voice box of the group. She always lets me know when it's time for a snack!

The other day, Rick was making a phone call and as he was dialing, I heard the beep as he punched the numbers. I had no idea they beeped when you dialed!! That was pretty cool!!

Yesterday morning, I heard the water filling up the toilet tank after a flush. It's always nice to get a thrill from hearing the toilet. My life is so full of excitement.

Then, on my way home yesterday, as I was sitting at a stop light -- I didn't have the radio on -- I heard the turn signal. I've not been able to hear that!

Also, today at work, I heard some people coming down the hall talking. I thought that's what it was and amazingly enough, two people came around the corner chit chatting! So, things are coming along!!!

But I'm also having some kind of issue. Things will get loud and then get soft. The only way I know how to describe it is if somebody had a dial and they would dial the noise up and then dial the noise down, then up and then down. The first time it happened I thought that maybe the battery in my processor was dying. But then it kept happening, so I knew that wasn't it. Then I thought maybe I had a bad processor. I doubted that, but the next day a tried a different processor (I have 2). Still the same thing the next day. Then I thought, maybe the ringing in my ear is starting to go away. That would be FABULOUS because I have really loud ringing all the time. But then I noticed that as the ringing and noise got softer, I wasn't picking up as much from my implant either. So, who knows?? I wrote Meg (my audiologist) to ask her if she had any ideas. I really didn't see this being a normal thing. As of right now, I still don't know. I got a reply from her and she has given my email to Dr. Jones. We are waiting to hear from him. Meg said it kind of sounds like a fluid problem to her. So we shall see. Nothing is ever easy for me!! Trouble follows me wherever I go!! Watch out if you see me coming!!