Category: Community Blog

Have you ever loved something so much you felt the need to put those emotions into words?

We at Phonak were happy to receive this poem from Mrs. Kim Howell, on her love for the Phonak Roger Pen.  Continue reading “A poem about the Roger Pen”

As mentioned in my Finding out our Baby was Deaf post, Harry received his first set of Phonak hearing aids when he was just 7 weeks old. It was quite a scary thought that our little baby would have to wear equipment on his ears, and that we, as his parents, would have sole responsibility of managing them. Thankfully, our local Audiology team was fantastic.  Daniel, our audiologist, made us feel completely at ease, and was so gentle while he took Harry’s first ear impressions for his molds.

When it came to choosing a color for his hearing aids I really wanted him to have a cute baby blue. My partner, Scott, was a little apprehensive about having a colored device, as he didn’t want them to stand out too much and for people to stare. But Harry had such a bald little head, and whatever he wore would have been on show! So, I managed to convince him that blue was the way forward. Continue reading “A lesson on baby’s first hearing aids”

I don’t normally like to write about my tinnitus because I find that thinking about it or even seeing the word written down makes me focus on mine and seems to intensify it. But, today my tinnitus is so bad, I figure writing this post isn’t going to make much difference.

I’ve suffered with tinnitus since I was a child. [I use the word ‘suffered’ quite deliberately because I feel that it is something unpleasant that I have to endure. I will explore the terminology and attitude later in this post.] I remember being very young and not being able to go to sleep because I thought I could hear the garage door banging repeatedly. My tinnitus then (and often still now) resembled the sound of a metal up and over garage door being slammed shut over and over. As you can imagine, I found this distressing. My Mum tried to reassure me that the noise was just my ear hearing the blood pumping round my body and that it was nothing to worry about, but it still kept me awake night after night, on and off for years.

When I started to lose my hearing in my thirties (as a result of a condition called otosclerosis), I began to notice my tinnitus more, and sometimes not just at night but in the daytime too. The audiologist who fitted my first digital hearing aid referred me to a hearing therapist. Continue reading “Tackling My Tinnitus”

In “Health and Hearing (Part I)” Stu talks about his journey in finding a reason for his hearing loss and his path for self healing with alternative medicine… 

I wanted to know why I had lost my hearing and what – if anything – I could do about it. I was willing to go wherever it took me.

Like most people, I depended on conventional western medical diagnoses, treatments and therapies for my health needs. So I had no idea where to go if not there. I was hardly in perfect health, but at 29 there were enough physical tics to suggest a look under the hood wasn’t a bad idea. I wanted to find an alternative path to health and wellness… something outside the box.

I was connected to a group of fellow travelers – many with serious ailments of their own – who turned me on to an astounding array of things to try. Acupuncture, spinal and TMJ adjustments and bite plates, colonic irrigations, meditation, massage, yoga, tai chi and an overwhelming variety of magic foods, supplements, drinks, etc. I jumped in with a vengeance at a sizable cost, as insurance companies weren’t covering much outside the conventional medical box.

Naïve to be sure, but I held out hope that one day, with the next chiropractic adjustment, colon cleanse, hour of meditation, or fruit smoothie my hearing would literally click back into place like turning on a light switch. So I was diligent. Fanatical. And though that did not happen, something else did.

Continue reading “Health and Hearing — A Way of Eating (Part II)”