“My hearing loss began in August 2009 when I suddenly lost most of my hearing in my left ear and was left with tinnitus or the constant sound of frying bacon, as I call it. It was startling and inconvenient. My coping skills helped to remind my friends and family that the right side of … Continued
To watch the full series of videos from each couple, please visit our Cochlear Americas YouTube page. Brenda and Brad Brenda’s gradual hearing loss made it tough to connect with her spouse, Brad, and her two daughters. She had struggled with hearing loss since she was in the first grade and gradually began to feel … Continued
“My hearing was perfect throughout my childhood. It was so perfect that my parents joked that I never missed anything. It was soon after I started college at 18 that my hearing started slipping away. It was such a subtle loss that it went mostly unnoticed for some time. Then one night nearing New Year’s … Continued
“For as long as I can remember I have been hearing impaired. For me, it has never been my identity, just a part of me. As a young child I had a surgery that took out the middle bones in my left ear when I was about 5 years old. I already had hearing loss … Continued
“Our daughter Nova was born on December 9, 2016 and we immediately fell head over heels in love with her. During our hospital stay, Nova met all the expectations that the doctors had for her. Although that quickly changed the morning we were getting ready to take her home when she was given her newborn … Continued
“I have worn hearing aids for over 33 years. As an infant and toddler, I had many ear infections. With those infections came very high fevers and my doctors believed that the high fevers were the reason for my hearing loss. My mom was my advocate and she spent countless hours with me at the … Continued
“Amanda, now 15 years old, was born profoundly deaf and not diagnosed until the age of 7 months. She was born with the Connexin 26 syndrome. Amanda received her first Cochlear implant at 16 months old and received her second Cochlear implant about a year later. Learning about cochlear implants We decided upon the Cochlear … Continued
“My name is Demetrius C., also known as Meech. I am 25 years old and from Staten Island, New York. I was born with normal hearing and lost my hearing in 2006 during the 8th grade after finding out I had a severe eye condition called uveitis which was caused by an unknown virus. The … Continued
“It was during a high school hearing test that I found out I had a hearing problem. Several years later, when I was 24 years old, I received my first set of hearing aids. I never loved them; they did the job of amplifying sounds and voices, but I always felt like someone stuck microphones … Continued
“My oldest daughter Macy was born hearing in August of 2012. I began to notice around 6 months old that there were times that she would seem to be ignoring me, but then at other times she was very attentive. I chalked it up to her being stubborn but always had that gut feeling that … Continued
Have you seen the viral video of mother, Anna E., and her child, Ayla’s cochlear implant activation? The sentiments that Anna experienced were palpable and showcases how emotional a cochlear implant activation can be. We asked Anna for her perspective on the journey to her daughter’s cochlear implant and what being a part of a … Continued
“Hello! My name is Abriana and I was born deaf. Sometimes there are not always answers to how someone can lose their hearing. I was born without hairs in my cochlea, and without hairs in your cochlea, you cannot hear! My journey to cochlear implants started with my parents deciding for me to undergo surgery … Continued
“Casey Marie was born on May 21, 2010, and it was the happiest day of my life. Casey was born at 5 pounds and 15 ounces; she was small but very healthy, wide eyed and hungry from the start. After spending bonding time with her, she was soon taken for her routine newborn hearing test. … Continued
“This is my unique story about my hearing loss and the journey back to hearing. Everyone’s journey is different, but we may share many of the things I went through. Fifty years ago while in high school, I noticed a tonal difference between my right and left ear. Over the years my left ear just kept … Continued
“’Your son has severe bilateral sensorineural hearing loss and will not develop speech without the use of assistive technology.’ We can still remember the silence and shock of that moment when the audiologist uttered those words after Levi’s first auditory brainstem response (ABR) test. Words that changed our lives and sent us down an unfamiliar … Continued
“I am a singer, born and bred. Having an internationally respected choral conductor for a father and a French teacher for a mother, our family always joked that they were breeding opera singers. Yes, I was the child that heard ‘Happy Birthday’ at the age of 2 and sang it back perfectly after one listening. … Continued
“I began to be aware that my hearing was changing when I first realized that I could not hear people in the back seat of the car. Hearing loss was a new experience for me at the age of 47. I had never experienced an earache or been evaluated by any hearing professional. I was … Continued
“When Chance had his initial newborn hearing test, he failed. A few weeks later, we took him to get another hearing test and he passed. When Chance was 2, we could tell something was not right, so we then got an auditory brainstem response test (ABR) to see what was going on. I remember crying when they … Continued
“At the age of 16, ‘what’ became my most used word. For the next 43 years after waking up with sudden and total hearing loss (single-sided deafness) in my right ear, I constantly asked people to repeat themselves. Back in the mid-1970s, my parents took me to doctors, but no one had an explanation. More … Continued
“On May 20, 2014, our son, Maxfield, was born five weeks early, but otherwise was perfectly healthy. This was our second child and everything seemed to be just the same as our daughter’s birth. When he did not pass the hearing screening in the hospital, we assumed it was a fluke. The second screening showed … Continued
“I was born with excellent hearing. Unfortunately, about 35 years ago when I was in my 40s, I had a traumatic experience, nothing physical, and slowly started to have hearing issues. When my daughters began complaining that I left the directional signals on in the car, I accepted the realization that I was not hearing … Continued