Yesterday, I went to a workshop and learned something very interesting. The electrode of a cochlear implant has 22 channels which are similar to frequencies. These channels are adjusted every time I go in for a mapping to make changes to my speech processor to improve the clarity and quality. Guess how many channels people with normal hearing have?
3, 500!
I find this amazing how much I can hear with the little number of channels I do have. At the same time, this supports why I think students with cochlear implants would still benefit from a sign language interpreter especially when there is a lot of background noise or many speakers. I wonder how many channels an electrode will hold 20 years from now?
If you would like to hear some stimulation's of channels, go to this web page...
http://www.ucihs.uci.edu/hesp/procSim/simulations.htm
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Friday, August 14, 2009
ONE YEAR!
Hello friends and family,
Today is the one year anniversary of new life with my cochlear implant. It truly has been an amazing year. Each season brought new sounds and experiences that I will forever cherish. Some of my favorite sounds were the leaves rustling, snow falling on my jacket, rain drops and birds chirping.
One of my biggest fears of getting the implant was that I would lose my identity in the Deaf world and not connect with my friends in that world anymore. I continue to stay involved with Deaf community events and keep close friendships. I greatly appreciate all of my friends, hearing, hard of hearing and deaf for their support along the way. I have learned an important lesson that my true friends will be there for me no matter what.
My life in the hearing world has become much easier. I feel that I am able to have more access to communication and able to follow everyday conversations. I do not feel like I am constantly missing information or working hard like I did before. Sometimes I catch myself being able to understand words in songs or on television without the support of captioning. This is still a very bizarre experience for me.
Lastly, I especially want to thank my loving family for their never ending support throughout this process. It has been a special experience to share with my brother Scotty. I couldn't have done this without you, especially my parents who were there on the day of my surgery and took care of me during my recovery.
Thanks for reading :)
Today is the one year anniversary of new life with my cochlear implant. It truly has been an amazing year. Each season brought new sounds and experiences that I will forever cherish. Some of my favorite sounds were the leaves rustling, snow falling on my jacket, rain drops and birds chirping.
One of my biggest fears of getting the implant was that I would lose my identity in the Deaf world and not connect with my friends in that world anymore. I continue to stay involved with Deaf community events and keep close friendships. I greatly appreciate all of my friends, hearing, hard of hearing and deaf for their support along the way. I have learned an important lesson that my true friends will be there for me no matter what.
My life in the hearing world has become much easier. I feel that I am able to have more access to communication and able to follow everyday conversations. I do not feel like I am constantly missing information or working hard like I did before. Sometimes I catch myself being able to understand words in songs or on television without the support of captioning. This is still a very bizarre experience for me.
Lastly, I especially want to thank my loving family for their never ending support throughout this process. It has been a special experience to share with my brother Scotty. I couldn't have done this without you, especially my parents who were there on the day of my surgery and took care of me during my recovery.
Thanks for reading :)
Monday, June 15, 2009
Mapping appointment - almost a year later
Hello family and friends,
I am currently at the Mayo Clinic, I just finished mapping (updating) my cochlear implant. It will be a year in August since I have been activated. This is the last season to experience with the implant and so far I am finding that there are birds chirping everywhere!
The past few months, I have felt like things were a little too quiet and noticed I started to use program two on my implant. This is the whisper program, which is increases the soft sounds in the environment, therefore it was the program I liked the best because it seemed louder than the other three programs. Lately, I have found myself a little more frustrated because I was not hearing well in noisy environments. I actually felt like I went backwards and was hearing like I still had my hearing aids on and straining to hear people. I found out that this is actually a terrible program to use when in loud places like in a school, party or noisy environment.
SO, I am VERY happy to finally have my implant readjusted and boosted! I am hearing things now! I am excited to be able to hear the sounds in my environment again. I didn't realize how much I was missing. Next time, I will not wait so long and go in to get remapped again. Usually when you are mapped, your volume is set at five then it will give you room to increase volume gradually to nine. So, I hit nine a month after I was adjusted last, so I been hearing too quiet for a while. Now, I am at volume three and have plenty of room to increase my volume if I want. It is fun to hear the littlest and most simple sounds again, such as people talking, walking nearby, faucet running and newspapers shuffling are a few I noticed greatly in the past 30 minutes. :) Also, I was able to improve the clarity of my implant as well, so we will see...
Thanks for reading!
Kristine
I am currently at the Mayo Clinic, I just finished mapping (updating) my cochlear implant. It will be a year in August since I have been activated. This is the last season to experience with the implant and so far I am finding that there are birds chirping everywhere!
The past few months, I have felt like things were a little too quiet and noticed I started to use program two on my implant. This is the whisper program, which is increases the soft sounds in the environment, therefore it was the program I liked the best because it seemed louder than the other three programs. Lately, I have found myself a little more frustrated because I was not hearing well in noisy environments. I actually felt like I went backwards and was hearing like I still had my hearing aids on and straining to hear people. I found out that this is actually a terrible program to use when in loud places like in a school, party or noisy environment.
SO, I am VERY happy to finally have my implant readjusted and boosted! I am hearing things now! I am excited to be able to hear the sounds in my environment again. I didn't realize how much I was missing. Next time, I will not wait so long and go in to get remapped again. Usually when you are mapped, your volume is set at five then it will give you room to increase volume gradually to nine. So, I hit nine a month after I was adjusted last, so I been hearing too quiet for a while. Now, I am at volume three and have plenty of room to increase my volume if I want. It is fun to hear the littlest and most simple sounds again, such as people talking, walking nearby, faucet running and newspapers shuffling are a few I noticed greatly in the past 30 minutes. :) Also, I was able to improve the clarity of my implant as well, so we will see...
Thanks for reading!
Kristine
Friday, April 24, 2009
Activation Video #2
Here is the second video that was taken. I had turned off my hearing aid and started to recognize voices with the implant only, especially my friend Sarah's voice! It was funny to hear it in a different way. This is how many people's voices started to appear to me, different than what I was used to, however now when I have the hearing aid turned off, I much prefer the crisper and clearer way that the implant provides of people's voices.
I tried my best to explain how things were sounding, it was truly a surreal experience. My audiologist finally did move out of that room with that awful fan noise! Also, the audiologist mentioned that not often do people recognize voices right away like I had. I feel very fortunate to have had so many years of using hearing aids with my residual hearing to be able to make this transition to implant smoother.
I tried my best to explain how things were sounding, it was truly a surreal experience. My audiologist finally did move out of that room with that awful fan noise! Also, the audiologist mentioned that not often do people recognize voices right away like I had. I feel very fortunate to have had so many years of using hearing aids with my residual hearing to be able to make this transition to implant smoother.
Activation Video #1 FINALLY!
Hello! I finally was able to upload my activation videos, I am very excited! I tried to sign for myself and interpret what my audiologist was saying for those of you who cannot hear; sometimes I didn't catch everything because I was so nervous, excited and overwhelmed all at once.
My voice sounds different to me, but I think that is normal for everyone. I plan to have someone videotape me now to see if my voice has changed since my activation. I've had a couple of people say it has especially my Dad says it sounds more clear and articulate than before. I think I sounded nasally before, not sure if that is still the case. I cannot believe how white I am! Need a little sunburn!
Kristine
My voice sounds different to me, but I think that is normal for everyone. I plan to have someone videotape me now to see if my voice has changed since my activation. I've had a couple of people say it has especially my Dad says it sounds more clear and articulate than before. I think I sounded nasally before, not sure if that is still the case. I cannot believe how white I am! Need a little sunburn!
Kristine
Friday, April 3, 2009
To use an earmold or not...
One of the reasons why I was excited to get a cochlear implant was to not have to use an earmold (the piece that fits in the ear, see photo above) anymore. Sometimes when using an earmold, it can make your ear feel plugged or itch. My older brother Scotty does not use an earmold with his implant and I was planning on not wearing one as well. Recently, the tubing of my earmold broke, so I had to go without an earmold for two weeks, this made me realize how much my earmold helps me. I have found that my speech processor will fall off more easily due to pushing my hair behind my ear, putting on sunglasses, leaning on my fist or bending over to pick up something. The most challenging thing is talking on a phone without using an earmold to keep it in place, it constantly slips off.
So, I have recently made a new earmold that has a vent to allow air to flow through and not feel as plugged. This works perfect and I am happy to have an earmold again. I did try "huggers" from cochlear, this clipped onto my ear from the top and bottom and left the inner ear free of an earmold. This didn't feel that comfortable because I was not used to having something touching my ear in those areas. Also, it looked odd when I was wearing it, so the earmold is the best choice for me.
Another thing, a few months ago, my boyfriend gave me an MP3 player to experiment with when listening to music. At first, I didn't use it that much because I never really used anything like it, maybe a walk-man in high school. There is a special cord that plugs into the player and plugs into the base of the speech processor. Lately, I have used the player when I go for walks around the lake or while I am working on something. I appreciate it more and starting to pick up more words in songs. Also, I like that it types out the song that is playing and the artist. This helps with my song recognition and usually the title is repeated throughout the song. That's all for now. Kristine
Thursday, March 19, 2009
MUSIC :)
Hello friends and family,
Last week, my hearing aid was not working well and I could not use it. This was the first time since I got implanted that I had to experience hearing unilaterally (one-sided). It was an eye-opening experience because it made me realize how much auditory benefit my hearing aid gave me and that I do not only rely on hearing through the implant. It was a frustrating few days of not hearing on both sides. I became a little crabby and it made me terribly tired because I had to focus harder on listening. So, I was thrilled to get my hearing aid back and have it reprogrammed. It is actually better than before, I do not notice that one side is more dull and quieter. My personal audiologist said it is probably how my brain is functioning and picking up new sounds with the implant that it may influence how I hear with my left ear.
Often I am asked about how the cochlear implant helps me. Initially, I thought that the implant would fix my hearing and bring it to perfect hearing. The implant is like a very powerful hearing aid. I am still a little hard of hearing especially in situations where many people are talking at once and there is a lot of background noise. However, I do hear much better than I ever had. This morning, I caught myself focusing on the words in the songs on the radio. I usually listen to the beat and most of time cannot make out the words. It was kind of a fun experience to catch myself singing along and figuring out the lyrics. One thing I realized was that lyrics are not sung in full sentences and there is a lot of repetition. There was a song that I used to like, but when I figured out the words, I was like "that's kind of cheesy" and really don't care to hear it again, ha.
I hope this finds you well!
K
Last week, my hearing aid was not working well and I could not use it. This was the first time since I got implanted that I had to experience hearing unilaterally (one-sided). It was an eye-opening experience because it made me realize how much auditory benefit my hearing aid gave me and that I do not only rely on hearing through the implant. It was a frustrating few days of not hearing on both sides. I became a little crabby and it made me terribly tired because I had to focus harder on listening. So, I was thrilled to get my hearing aid back and have it reprogrammed. It is actually better than before, I do not notice that one side is more dull and quieter. My personal audiologist said it is probably how my brain is functioning and picking up new sounds with the implant that it may influence how I hear with my left ear.
Often I am asked about how the cochlear implant helps me. Initially, I thought that the implant would fix my hearing and bring it to perfect hearing. The implant is like a very powerful hearing aid. I am still a little hard of hearing especially in situations where many people are talking at once and there is a lot of background noise. However, I do hear much better than I ever had. This morning, I caught myself focusing on the words in the songs on the radio. I usually listen to the beat and most of time cannot make out the words. It was kind of a fun experience to catch myself singing along and figuring out the lyrics. One thing I realized was that lyrics are not sung in full sentences and there is a lot of repetition. There was a song that I used to like, but when I figured out the words, I was like "that's kind of cheesy" and really don't care to hear it again, ha.
I hope this finds you well!
K
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