Recently my hearing was tested, and the audiologist determined there was a substantial amount of hearing loss. At first I was devastated and simply refused to believe I was going to have to wear a hearing aid for the rest of my life.

photo credit: adotjdotsmith

I went through the motions and received the fitting, learned how to use the device, and left the doctor’s office with absolutely no intention of ever actually using the darned thing.

This of course changed about 10 minutes or so after I walked the my front door. The nature of that change? Lovingly referring to my wife of course.

She was gentle in how she approached me when she discovered my relative refusal of wearing the hearing aid. The first thing she told me was how proud she was that I had actually gone through the entire process and was now the owner of the device.

Next she let me know how much my hearing aid was going help her. Excuse me? Her hearing checked out perfectly. How was the fact that I needed to use this thing help her. Again, patiently, she explained what had been a growing challenge for her the past several years.

My hearing loss caused her to have to repeat just about everything she said to me. Often times we would argue simply because I had misheard the words she spoke. I finally understood and realized the hearing aid was not the end of life as I knew it, but the beginning of something better.

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