This image has nothing to do with sound waves. I just really like it.

I was at the audiologist’s last week for a hearing test and a readjustment of my hearing aids. As usual, the audiologist described the results solely in terms of hearing loss, but as you may have noticed, I describe them in terms of hearing difference. That’s the result of many years of back and forth in understanding my ears.

I was born hearing and now I’m deaf. I don’t have an issue with saying that. Medically speaking, I lost much of my ability to hear and the medical solution to that has been hearing aids and auditory training programmes, although we did also discuss surgery. So hearing loss fits as a medical term.

However, I can still hear and process some sounds, even without hearing aids. I’m profoundly deaf to everything except sounds between roughly 250 and 500 Hz, and I’m severely deaf to those. With my hearing aids on their newest settings (and provided I have contextual clues, there’s not too much surrounding noise, and I can see the person I’m talking to), I can hold a conversation. It’s tiring because it demands a lot of focus, especially as I’m getting used to how those new settings have altered the quality of the sound.

So: I have lost considerable hearing but I also still have some hearing. Compared to “the medical norm”, my ability to hear is less, disabled, and different. All three terms are valid. Less than what I had when I was younger, disabled because society is structured on the assumption that everyone can hear at or close to “the norm”, different to what it was and what “the average person” has.

While all three terms are valid, I’ve found recently that I prefer to say that I’m deaf* and that I have a hearing difference rather than saying “I’ve lost my hearing”. I’m not sure that I can explain why that’s right for me. It’s a visceral reaction to the words “lost” and “loss”. Even when the audiologist said it, I had to suppress a shudder. It just doesn’t sit right.

Having the luxury to explore what terms sit right for me with regard to my disabilities is not lost on me. As I go deeper into the story, I’ll talk about that some more. For now, hearing loss is medically right; hearing difference is personally right.

*While we’re on the subject of terms: I use lowercase d for deaf rather than capital D for Deaf because I don’t come from a Deaf family and I’m not part of the Deaf culture. That’s a topic for another post.

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