Falling in Love with Audiobooks

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you would know that I recently got two cochlear ear implants. Just to put it all into perspective  I was born deaf, I grew up Deaf went to a Deaf school a Deaf college, etc. I couldn’t hear anything with what passed as hearing aids back in the day. I would put them in, and everyone ELSE could hear them squealing but me? Nothing nada I somehow learned how to talk without hearing the English language spoken. It was not easy. I have a Deaf accent so it not like my speech is flawless.
A lot of the people that I went to college with started getting implants. The reason why so many did not get it before is that well the tech sucked big hard donkey balls. In the last three years, the technology for the implants has grown by leaps and bounds. Everyone that I know of that has gotten implanted within the previous three years were all like OMG YO I CAN HEAR!! I started to get jealous and made me an appt with Cleveland clinic to get my implants.
Everyone was like hmmm ok but remember you were born and grew up deaf so don’t expect TO much was the refrain I heard. I mean I grew up when the Dr’s were still pushing for an all-oral method. If there was any way you could get by as oral no sign language for you, Well I was laced an “oral failure” to give you an idea of how bad my hearing and lipreading skills were.
So I set the bar low. It was long hard work to get my deaf brain to understand exactly what was happening. My audiologist told me to listen to audiobooks on the Kindle while reading and that may help me. So began a long and arduous journey of learning how to hear at the ripe old age of 37. I must be honest I damn near gave up. I was at my mom’s house, and I declared my implant a piece of shit, and she made me put it back on and to shut her up I did. Well a few days after THAT my brain started making sense out of sounds!
I read and listened to audiobooks constantly. Imean I would spend HOURS reading and listening. It seemed that at times I wasn’t making any progress, but the dr said I was to keep at it. So I did. Slowly I started being able to understand spoken words without having to read along. For two years I practiced. Then one day a couple of months ago I was doing my usual listening exercises. I only had an audiobook with me. I was getting a lot of speech but not all of it. This time, however, I realized that I could understand the audiobook (The Keto Reset Diet) without needing the book at all. I did have the speech slowed down, but still, this discovery was fucking amazing. After I was done with the Keto Reset Diet I wanted to make sure my newfound ability to understand spoken language was not a fluke, so I started listing to You Are A Badass At Making Money and I could understand that also! Before I had a problem with my brain wondering with audiobooks but now it is much better. I also don’t have to be so focused on the audiobook to understand it. I can listen and clean my apartment at the same time for example.
I realize how good this is gonna be. People will give you evil looks if you are at a gathering and you pull out your Kindle but now I can just turn on an audiobook, and it streams straight into my implants, and I can pretend to give a fuck whenever someone is talking to me, but really I will be listening to my audiobook. This is gonna make family gatherings so much more bearable.

I was not expecting to be able to understand audiobooks as I do. It was a shock when I realized I could. I have to say I now love audiobooks. I have to be careful because some people I cant understand. I tried listening to the Tsar of Love and Techno, but the Russian accent was….not decipherable to my just learning to hear brain. I have read the print version an I loved it, but I had to give up on the audiobook. That made me really sad but ah well. And there are some people that I feel could have used some speech therapy earlier in life. At first, I thought I was just being mean but after reading some other people audiobook reviews I realized that the narrator can make or break an audiobook.

I try and always have an audiobook on my phone at all times. It makes being around other humans more tolerable.#kiddingnotkidding Plus I get sick while reading in a moving vehicle so now I can just listen to an audiobook and still get some reading done. Maybe in 2018, I will make my goal of 200 books read. I can hope. Also when I am feeling anxious, I have a hard time focusing on a print book. I had an anxiety attack a few days ago and an audiobook took my mind off of the anxious feeling, and I could understand it, so it was a win-win