How hard is hard of hearing?
I just learned that Mary Louise Kelly, NPR journalist and co-host of “All Things Considered,” is hearing impaired. Like me, she wears hearing aids – and recognizes the corresponding stigma.
When I told people I was getting hearing aids, I got reactions of sympathy, as if I’d said I was going for cancer treatments. Had I announced an impending trip to the optometrist, nobody would flinch. Maybe they’d ask about the style, color, and extra features of my new glasses, but nobody would feel sorry for me because I had to wear them.
The fact is, if folks didn’t feel the need to hide their hearing problems, they’d be able to communicate more easily – alerting people to their hearing deficits, asking for less background noise when feasible, or ensuring speakers’ faces can be seen unencumbered. Cues from lips and facial expressions are always helpful. But our culture often denies people these advantages because the hearing impaired are encouraged to be embarrassed about their lack of audiological prowess.
Hearing aids, while immensely useful, don’t re-create normal hearing. As Kelly stated in an interview in the Washington Post “… They’re uncomfortable, and I still struggle to make out every word. It’s kind of like a foreign language you speak very well but not completely, so you’re always a little behind. That’s what English is like for me now… ”
It’s so true! Even though I love my hearing aids and they render speech far more audible than my naked ears, it still requires effort to keep up with conversation. The greater the number of people conversing at one time, the more energy it takes. Sometimes it just gets too difficult and I tune out completely. But if I do that with any regularity, people will think I’m demented, which carries stigma similar to, but greater than, hearing impairment.
There are times I intentionally don’t wear my aids – when there is background music that’s not as much in the background as I’d like, or when the clatter of dishes is not confined to a restaurant’s kitchen, for example. In such cases I might need to move closer to a person who is speaking. Or alter the setting so I can look directly at the face conveying the message. For this, I need to be unafraid to declare myself hearing impaired. Otherwise, I come across as, well, um… creepy.
I didn’t get to choose the color of my hearing aids. My audiologist chose for me – a hue that would “blend with my hair so nobody would know I was wearing aids.” I didn’t tell him, but I was peeved. I wanted cobalt blue or day-glow orange – some color that would announce there is no reason to be ashamed of a hearing deficit. (I bought bulbous custom-made earplugs in bubblegum pink from this same audiologist, to protect my hearing at live music events. For this, he supported my color choice with gusto. Earplugs do not imply hearing deficit, so there is no stigma.)
During my career as a speech-language pathologist, I sometimes worked with hearing impaired students – to teach them to use available visual cues and advocate for themselves in a variety of situations. How much easier that would have been if hearing aids had been cool. If there had been Batman or rainbow glitter models available. Mostly my students were embarrassed by their hearing aids, and sometimes – accidentally – left them at home.
So, kudos to Kelly for attempting to open the closet into which the hearing impaired have been stuffed. Made my day!