Well I've been officially turned on for a week! I've discovered some good points, and some not so great points that I hope will be improved when my programming happens later this week.
I have very much enjoyed the quality of sound- the static is still there, however greatly reduced. This is something that I hope programming will eventually get rid of. Quiet environments are now mostly quiet instead of staticky most of the time, but even as I sit in my house typing this there is background static to the world and not clear sounds. Most voices, including my own, have a slight static to them. As of right this moment, the only programs in my processor are 3 steps of louder which I haven't used much. I find the louder I make things, the more static I get.
In General:
I am understanding most people in a quiet environment with a little extra work on my part. My husband being the exception. He's had a sore throat the last two weeks and is just now finally recovering and his voice is difficult to understand. He has a habit of talking to me while facing the other direction. I'd like to throw a shoe at him at least a few time's a day...*aggravated sigh*
I have found that the background-damping "learning listening environments" software to be absolutely fabulous everywhere but in a car! In restaurants I've had wonderful access to my husband's voice without background noise interference. Even Disney was very pleasant. Holding a conversation in a moving car is tough.
On Music:
I love music- It's aways been a focus in my life and I want to be able to enjoy the full spectrum of it as much as possible. I've been slowly losing that over the last 13 years and this has been one of my biggest personal adaptation issues as my hearing loss progresses. I have found that acquiring new music is even more difficult for me now than ever as within the last year my ability to understand speech has declined drastically. I went from understanding 80% of speech sounds to understanding 28% of speech sounds in one year. Thats in my better ear. I have bought exactly zero new music in the last several years. I have re-acquired a few old, lost albums from obscure artists I enjoyed in my youth, but gotten nothing NEW. Understanding music requires that I listen while studying lyrics until I learn the pattern. I have also discovered I can no longer listen to instrumental music most of the time because I can no longer hear most of it.
Listening to music is by turns awesome and frustrating right now. I expect that this, too will be improved with programming. Right now I can listen to music as usual in my car where I can crank it and no one else cares if I sing on-key or not. Less compression in programming has made it so I'm not so off key anymore and songs don't randomly change keys mid-line anymore. There's still a lot of static- especially with rock music. I am still getting a lot more bass than anything else. I can mostly hear vocals as long as I don't sing along. Singing along produces even more static, and I can't hear myself singing along with the music- because static. I am looking forward to programming that should help with these issues.
What's Next:
I will go in later this week and they will begin programming my processor with all the fun bits that come along side with such a great piece of technology. I am really looking forward to becoming a more advanced user of this tech. As I go I will be posting more about the technology itself and how it works as well as how it works for me personally.
For now, I am off to do homework! Yes, school is out for my students, but I must still take classes required by my district for my "intent to earn" as well as study for my professional educator test and for the re-take of the math sub-test of the General Knowledge exam. I am also a graduate student and need to sign up for my Fall semester classes! I DID mention I'm nuts, right?
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