10 months in

How has 6 months flown by since my last post? Life has got in the way rather but I have been constantly surprised at my new hearing! Actually no that's a lie. I have been intermittently surprised at my new hearing, but I've stopped thinking of it as "new". It's now just my hearing, which is much better than it used to be. My family have stopped being surprised that I can hear them with my back to them. Last night we watched Paddington Bear and I heard a mistake in the subtitles - 107 instead of 101! David was very excited.

I went for my retuning a couple of weeks ago, and met a new audiologist called Vicky. We did the usual listening to quietest sounds, where I sat and listened for sounds and must have driven Vicky crazy by saying "2! No, 3! No, 4!" for 20 minutes. She didn't do the loudest sounds as Jen had done my ESRT last time, and that tends not to change too much. She then changed my programme according to what I had heard on my quietest sounds. The new program wasn't as noticeably different as the last few have been, but I could tell that it was different in some way. 

Then we did my BKB sentence testing again - last time I had got to 67% compared to 16% pre-implant, in my left ear. This time I found it a bit easier but had no idea how well I was doing until we stopped and Vicky said, in awe, "You got 90%!"

I had no idea that it would be that splendid a score - but I was very happy with it! Only 10 months after switch-on too! Hopefully it will continue to improve and I'll be getting 100% at some point - I'm told my brain will carry on plastically changing for up to 2 years - fantastic. I really should be working harder at using the phone - I can still really only call David from the car when I finish work. I think if I had been able to use the phone before, I would have fallen back into using it very quickly, but because the grooves of my life have settled into Whatsapp and texting and email it's much easier to carry on in those grooves. I must get out of my comfort zone! 

Vicky was so pleased with my progress I am now on yearly follow up, but I'm seeing Sandra next week for some more help with using the phone. On that note I am off to order some more T loop ear hooks from Connevans. Will report back with how I get on.