A mothers burden...

I called my mom last night like I normally do, I have been talking to her longer and longer it feels. I think I am getting a little worried about the fact that I may not be able to have a conversation on the phone after my second implant.

To those of you that do not realize what an implant does to your ear after surgery, It makes you lose what residual hearing you had and your brain has to "Re-Learn" how to hear again.

as I was talking to my mom about someone who must not be named "Asshole" there's a name that we can call him, haha. I learned something about mom that I really would have never have guessed in a million years. She carried a secret from me for a long time, My hearing loss is degenerative. What a shocker this is. I have always thought for a long time that my hearing was not degenerative and wasn't going to get worse. For my mom to have to live with the burden of that knowledge, must have been hard as hell on her. I do know why she had to keep it from me for so long and its my own damned fault, I told her at a early age, maybe 12 or 13, that I would not like it very much if I went completely deaf, and would probably get suicidal. WOW what an incredible burden to carry, I love my mom she is and will always be there for me.

It just amazes me, as a parent, we long to protect our kids from harm. something that I really didnt understand until my kids came into my life!

I love you mom!

Hearing People Suck!!!

The reason for this is, I have an outgoing message on my phone that states I am deaf and to either email me or speak slowly so i could hear the message. you think they do this??? NO!! and to make matters worse it was the hospital calling me. I mean come on, they should be able to slow down a little. so now I tried to find out who called me by calling numerous numbers and making an ass out of myself.... or go down to the hospital clinic which by the way I am going to have to do today!!!

come on people if someone says very clearly that they are hearing impaired and wants you to either email them or speak slowly and clearly it shouldn't be hard!!!

Hearing people SUCK!!!

JAY BRANNAN

Well I am finally going to meet the guy who is responsible for the first song that I heard with my left implant. His concert is tonight and I am going to go with Trish Filipi, an awesome friend of mine. I actually introduced her to Jay's music. My favorite song from Jay is "Housewife" it fits me to a "T" but I HAVE met him, My Dr. James. He is my soul mate, best friend, confidant, the sparkle in my eye. James is and has been so supportive of me with everything I do in life. Be it, education, employment goals, life goals and of course my Implants. If I didnt have James' support with the Cochlear Implant ordeal, I would not have been able to have done it. Now don't get me wrong I do have my mom's 100% support, its just hard with her being so far away.

I just looked at the countdown counter and realized I have 30 days until the big day!!
This is a big step for me. I am actually going to be giving up my residual hearing and become fully deaf. Without my implants on I will not be able to hear ANYTHING! I still can hear some with my right ear without my hearing aid, like doors closing, loud clapping, planes, trucks going by, but they are not sounds that I will miss... what i am going to miss doing is my favorite thing and that is, cranking up the stereo in my car and listening to housewife. :)

I am ready to say good bye to my hearing, I will be in mourning for it but I will not be disappointed with my decisions thus far. its kind of like the same feeling that I had when I let my dads side of the family go. I had to let my dad go due to a lot of reasons but decided that it would be healthier to live my life with out being disappointed, hurt, feeling of being unloved, feeling like I didnt matter. I mean come on I am the one that ALWAYS called the whole family. I have only gotten calls that were bad news, usually a death in the family occurred. This is a lame family to belong to. There are a couple people in it that talk to me, and I will always cherish them in my life and have a place for them.

Anyhoo, I am getting off track here... Trish is on her way to pick me up so we are going to dinner and then the show!

Moving along quickly.

I have been home all day due to my migraine hitting me like a fucking freight train! I cant wait for my pain management appointment to get this under control. I had to miss school all day. I think my bruxism (grinding of the teeth) brought it on. Anyway, I just talked with my mom like I normally do every night ( I try to stay in touch with her as much as I can) and I came to a realization while talking with her and James a little earlier. I am finally at peace with losing my hearing, I got so worked up over it that it had made me extremely irritable, bitchy, and not fun to be around. (sorry James, I will work on it!) I have come to terms with the fact that I am indeed going deaf and it is not the end of the world. Of course I will be getting the implant to replace the hearing that I had in that ear to even more awesome levels. its going to be a new course of discovery for me all over again. at least now I know what to expect with this adventure. Such as, the course of surgery, recovery, and rehabilitation. I am looking forward to it, like a kid on Christmas morning.

Earlier tonight I made my droid phone into a music player and hooked it up to the implant. Wow, I was not expecting to hear all the little scores of music that I had been missing from the long list of favorite songs of mine. I love Broadway musicals (at least I admit it!) I listened to Chorus line soundtrack, one of my favorite songs is the music and the mirror. I heard little sounds from the piano that I didn't hear before, and was quite taken aback from it. I am happy and proud to have gotten the implant, if I had to do it again, I would. oh yeah, I am!

I met someone that was hard of hearing yesterday at school who was hard of hearing like I used to be. She asked me lots of questions about it. She is losing her hearing and wants to explore the possibility of getting one. Her reason for not getting it done for real is her parents. They are part of the hard core deaf culture, and anti-cochlear implant. My response to her was that she should get it and not worry too much of what others think of her. We only have this one life and I want to experience it to its fullest.

Oh yeah, I found out the times and dates for everything to happen in regards to my implant. I have my post-op with my surgeon November 10th. Then the big day of activation is November 17th.

Agonizing steps of waiting for everything to come into place.....

I just got the the approval from the insurance company on the 3rd of September, and my surgery date is scheduled for October 19th. I have to be there at 0830 with surgery starting at 1030 at the University of Minnesota Medical Center, Fairview campus. I have to stay overnight. I just now have to get a physical 7 - 10 days before. There are couple of differences from the first surgery to the second one. You do not have to see a psychiatrist for approval, your don't need another meningitis vaccine, and most cases you get a faster approval from your medical insurance for the 2nd one. There is one constant, aural rehabilitation, anyone who has had an implant must go to this. I like to think of it as physical therapy for your brain to train it to accept your CI. most people that I have found that do not wear their CI anymore did not go to or complete the aural rehabilitation, which is a BIG mistake. I mean why go through the process of countless appointments, physical, psychiatric evaluations, and the surgery to not follow through. It is a waste of money, let someone else have the chance of getting a CI if you're not going to follow through. Most people wear it for about 3 weeks and give up on it, the number one complaint I hear about is the fact that every time you turn the CI on after waking up is mid blowing and loud. You do eventually get used to it. I am still not used to it. Every time I turn my CI back on, I make a humming noise while it is powering on and it has helped me cope with the loud jolt of stimuli to the brain.

The ear is at it again !!

Well I am going to first apologize for not updating this blog. I have had a crazy life since my last blog entry. I think I am just going to add some entries little by little to kind of fill in the blanks. Anyhoo, I just wanted to blog about my hearing and how it is going with the left ear implant. after I got my implant activated I had to have Aural Rehabilitation (rehab for the brain to learn to hear again) and I didn't think it was helping and a waste of my time and money. Now, I have the utmost respect for aural rehab, it works.

Over the past couple months I have noticed that my right ear is not up to par. I thought it was allergies or congestion, then it happened, tinnitus! GRRRRR! I think I have mentioned how much I loathe the ringing, scraping, grinding, rattling, squishy sounds in my head before. Well, I hate it. In my own personal opinion it is my body telling me that my ear is dying.

I just made an appointment with my audiologist and ENT (ear, nose and throat doc) on the same day. They both told me that I am a candidate for the implant and that they would get the ball rolling to get the surgery date scheduled. As I left the office all I could think of was James and how patient he has been with me and how much he loves and supports me in everything that I do. I consider myself one of the luckiest people on this planet. I have a supportive partner, mother, brother, kids and friends. I am not worried about the surgery or losing my hearing in the right ear completely if the implant does not work. It couldn't be any worse than it is now. the only real big thin that I would miss is hearing on the phone but my ability to hear on the phone now is on a rapid decline. I am going to try and get some training on my left ear with the telephone, and "program" it to be able to hear on it. I am hopeful but I do realize that its gonna be a lot of work.

I am taking classes once again and start this Monday, I just hope that I don't screw anything up at school with my future implantation. I am only going to be in the hospital overnight and it should be routine like the other one, and I can deal with the activation throughout the school semester. I just really want to get into U of M and finish my degree, asap.