For the first time... in my entire life really... I can hear like most normal folks.
All through life I've had a pretty significant hearing loss due to essentially dying when I was born. The cord wrapped around my neck as I was being delivered, thus I was a blue baby when I came out. My ears turned out fine, but the nerves that carry the sound to the brain were damaged. I essentially have a 40% hearing loss, especially on the low end of sound range.
Well, thanks to the constant persistence of my lovely wife, yesterday I became the proud owner of two brand new digital hearing aids. I feel like i'm starting my life all over again! I cannot believe not only how much I was missing, but just how amazing digital hearing aid technology is today.
What's incredible about these things is they no longer have a volume control. They auto compress loud sounds and turn up in quiet settings. So instead of just everything around me getting 50% louder, only the immediate area around me is raised up while everything else is normal. And anything that's loud is just reduced to normal level. They're just like some of those really expensive microphones we all see in the magazines.
So if any of you have a hearing loss, or know someone who has one and they're resisting hearing aids, encourage them to get a test. These things are just awesome and very comfortable.
Oh and if you want to save some money, I got mine at Costco believe it or not!
Yes, Costco has a hearing aid center in most stores and they perform the testing right there. Digital Hearing aids are not molded to the ear anymore, they're just like TV IFB's with a small inserts so you can literally test them out on the spot.
I narrowed it down to two units. One has the speaker inside the ear canal while the other has the speaker outside the canal with a tube that goes down into the ear. The one with the speaker outside actually had a better range, but I felt like my voice was coming down a tube. Didn't like the sound of it. So I went with the ones that have speaker down in the canal.
They were around $3,200 and well worth it. Life expectancy for them is around 6 years.
Thats good news! I have a terrible problem with high frequency sounds. If there's alot of background noise..forget about me hearing you. It does get in the way in some social situation - which is the hardest for me to do deal with sometimes. I have often gone without knowing what a group was talking about since I couldn't understand the whole conversation.
Costco? Do they do testing? How do you know which aid is best for you? I've never used a hearing aid.
Funny, when I worked at Foxwoods Resort Casino, the animator used to joke all the time that he couldn't understand why they didn't make me the Sound Designer instead of the Video Editor!
Working in the edit suite has never been a problem for me as I always edit loud, with or without the hearing aids. But Directing and meeting with clients has become harder and harder as my hearing had definitely dropped a bit.
I put this off for so long because I just remember how analog hearing aids worked and I hated them. EVERYTHING became too loud instead of just what I wanted to hear. Now everything is still a bit louder, but it's all "normal loud." My wife especially appreciates that the TV is now 1/2 the volume it used to be before I got these things.
Good Ol' Costco. I think half of our house is from Costco!
It is truly amazing how technology when its used for good purposes can touch someone so deeply. I'm amazed everyday by stories of people who have found technological devices that can truly improve their quality of life. Its great to hear stories like this!
Welcome to the wonderful world of complete sound, Walter. Its really great to hear something so wonderful in a person's life that it touches all of your friends around you.
I do have to say that it amazes me that you are an editor/producer/director and have hearing trouble. I bet that could have been a challenge some of the time.
Professional Video Editor, Producer, Director since 1990.
Credits include multiple Emmys, Tellys, Aurora and CableAce Awards.
Owner / Operator of Biscardi Creative Media, a full service video and film production company with about 65% of our work in HDTV. The show you know us best for is "Good Eats" on the Food Network. I developed the HD Post workflow and we also create all the animations for the series.
Favorite pastime is cooking with pizza on the grill one of my specialties. Each Christmas Eve we serve the Feast of the Seven Fishes, a traditional Italian seafood meal with approx. 30 items on the menu.
If I wasn't in video production I would either own a restaurant or a movie theater.
