Activation - DON'T be Discouraged!

[Guest guest]

Hello ,

I was activated in July so my experience is still quite fresh in my mind. I

sure hope you do not get discouraged by your results the first few days or

even weeks, the fact that you can hear sound means the CI and the implant

are working. I am sure many will tell you this, but we are all different and

progress with the CI for each of us is very different. I have been extremely

lucky, I was able to understand some speech the first day, but I did find my

CI was very noisy and confusing at times. It took about a week until I

adjusted to all of the environmental sounds that others just take for

granted, like cars driving by outside my home or office, fans, water

dripping from a tap (that still drives me nuts!), paper - opening of

envelopes, turning newspaper pages, and my favorite (not) the toilet

flushing. These things are all new to your brain (or new again) so take your

time and take it slow, it does get better I have not yet heard anyone with a

CI say it gets worse! I was given the same advise as you – do not use the

aid for a few months, I have not and I am glad I do not need it now, I doubt

I will ever try it again.

You did not say which CI you have so I can’t really comment on the battery

weight, however I chose the new Freedom, and I found it is heavier than my

aid was, and it did seem to bother my ear at first. I have been moving it up

on my ear a little more the past few weeks and that feels much better for

me, I have also seen in where other say they use a little piece of mole skin

next to their head and that helps too.

Your comment about getting away from reading lips, well lets hope you do not

need to much longer, but for me I kind of like to keep trying to read others

lips, I find it is a great skill and I don’t want to loose it. I am doing

great in most situations, but when there is any amount of background noise

or a crowd, the sound from the CI is still some what confusing and I depend

on my lip reading skills (such as they are).

I wish you luck, and I am sure with time and future fine tuning of your maps

things will only get better.

Take care,

Mike “Ears Hopin” P

Implanted June 3/05

Activated July 6/05

Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2005 11:53:56 -0000

From: " sampsonkathryn " <pksampson@...>

Subject: Activation

I went yesterday to be activated & I can hear some but basically

everything sounds muffled & @ times overwhelming noisy. I'm supposed

to go without my HA to train my brain to get used to the CI. I know I

have been told by so many people not to expect much in the beginning.

I chose the behind the ear device as I have the behind the ear HA.

However, the weight of the battery bothers my ear & now I'm wondering

if I chose the right type.

I brought up getting away from having to read lips eventually to my

audiologist & she told me that I may always have to read lips. This

was very discouraging to hear.....

My husband is very encouraging & says things will get better.....

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