Story about my hearing loss

You may sometimes find that I behave as if I have difficulties understanding our conversations. Here is the story that may explain the reason. I am still in the process of finding and accepting myself.

When I was in primary school in China, some of my classmates joked about my accent, saying I have a “big tongue”. I wasn’t mad. I knew they were jokes. I didn’t have major problems in communication (or so I thought) with others. I have some close friends, and we supported each other, sometimes with friendly banter. My best friends explained that my pronunciation of some words, like Qi and Ti, is different from most people. Sadly, Qi is also my first name. I asked my friends to teach me to speak “Qi,” and I repeated it. Sometimes they nodded, but most times they shrugged. I indeed couldn’t tell the difference between their pronunciation and mine. I told my parents that some students made fun of my accent, and they thought I spoke normally, comforting me not to overthink it. Time went by until the last year of my high school when my mom took me to have a hearing exam.

The results indicated that I have severe high-frequency hearing loss, with my results across various frequencies being similar to my mother's. High-frequency sounds include bird calls, certain machinery noises, and some pronunciations containing consonants like "s," "p," "t," and "ch." At the age of 18, I found it challenging to come to terms with suddenly having a disability, and I was shocked to know that such hearing loss is irreversible and that the only remedy is wearing hearing aids. My mother took me to the hearing exam following her own during a routine physical examination, recognizing that sometimes my speech and listening patterns mirrored hers. The doctor speculated that our condition might be linked to antibiotics we both had taken previously. I'm not sure what my mother was thinking, but my world seemed to be falling apart.

Despite this, at the time, the hearing loss did not significantly affect my social life at school in China. On a positive side, understanding my condition shed light on many aspects of myself. My pronunciation sounds strange because I mimic what I hear, and the world I hear differs from most people.

I purchased my hearing aids in 2019 to facilitate my English learning, aiming specifically to enhance my TOEFL listening and speaking exam scores, which were prerequisites for applying to PhD programs in the US. Believing that further practice alone would not suffice, given the extensive amount of time I had already dedicated to practicing, I decided to consult a doctor and explore the use of hearing aids.

The hearing aids were somewhat helpful, but their effectiveness was limited. I began to hear sounds from machinery, such as the beeps from microwaves and elevators—sounds I had never heard before. However, when it came to understanding human speech, the improvement was marginal. The doctor explained that such high-frequency hearing loss is challenging to be fully compensated by hearing aids.

Forward to the present, I still face challenges in spoken communication, particularly in English. I often find myself asking others to repeat themselves. My frustration came back after attending a conference recently. Following presentations was sometimes manageable because of the visual aids provided by slides. However, social interactions was difficult due to the noisy environment, although I hear better in more enclosed spaces. Engaging in conversations, especially for the first time, I felt too embarrassed to ask people to repeat themselves if I didn’t understand. Sometime I pretended to hear and responded with a smile of agreement, but such reactions cannot make the conversation proceed. When analyzing the reasons, I oscillated between owing it to my English proficiency and my hearing impairment. To be honest, I don't believe the issue lies with English, as I haven’t had difficulties learning most things. I also hesitated to admit it is due to my hearing, as this is a problem I can’t fix, and I feared it would ruin my research career.

I recently consulted an audiologist, harboring low expectations prior to the clinic visit. Following the hearing examination, I discussed my hearing loss history with the doctor, who then provided me with a pair of hearing aids to test. The clarity of both his speech and my own moved me to tears. The treatment plan remained incomplete due to insurance issues, but the experience give me some hope.

This visit was a turning point, prompting me to accept my hearing loss fact and to proactively search for solutions. I wished for my loved ones to comprehend my auditory experience as clearly as the doctors. To achieve this, I discovered a tool that could modify human speech by frequencies. I played the audio mimicking the sound I hear to my partner. My partner said with excitement that this is similar to the way I speak, where some “s”, “p”, etc., are blurred. I was excited, too.

I would like to share this story and the sounds that I hear.

To feel the sound I hear, go to link: https://wwwn.cdc.gov/niosh-mining/HLSimWeb

Choose the “Manual adjustment by frequency” on the right panel, and adjust the frequency bands as below, which is my hearing exam result. Then you can select the Foreground sound of, e.g., Human speech - Male, and compare the sounds of “No hearing loss” and “Manual adjustment by frequency”.