It must've hailed in the night as this morning at 6am, I walked out of the house to the bus stop in the dark with some street lighting. My CI (cochlear Implant) and HA (hearing aid) picked up the crunching sounds of the snow/hail/frost on the ground as I walked. I gathered quite a lot of information between my CI and HA from the crunching sounds. I alternated the CI and HA to hear the difference in sounds - switching HA off and moved the magnet on CI alternately.
1. The CI gave me a lot more information on the detail of the crunching sound, depth and the pitches. 2. The HA only gave me limited information, only gave me the overall crunching sound and no depth to the sound but it did give me the pitches of the crunchiness albeit on a lesser scale. 3. The HA simply amplified the sounds and transposed them down to the lower frequencies, thus distorting it slightly, any more amplification - turning the volume made the disortion worse - much to my surprise! 4. I found that the CI did not amplify or transpose them, it simply interpreted the sounds and sent it as electronic signal which my brain deciphered it as sound. If I turned the volume up slightly - it just made it louder without any loss of distortion but it was slightly uncomfortable.
Overall conclusionThe CI gave me a richer information input compared to the HA. I have been walking around with the CI for 6 months before I started to wear the HA on the unimplanted ear to keep it stimulated and it was then I realised that I was getting an awful lot out of the CI.
The benefit of having cochlear implant DO vary from person to person as their hearing loss and experiences varies among the CI recipients. It has been found that a few was not getting much benefit out of the CI and some found equal benefit as it was with their HA's and others say it surpasses the benefit that they had with the HA with the CI. If that makes sense?
I suspect I belong to the latter group even it's been only 6 months and what a rollercoaster ride it has been so far and I'm not regretting it for a single minute.
Right at this moment, I'm a little preoccupied with my HA mould because it is irritating unimplanted my ear after not wearing it for 6months. I reckon it's the time it's had without a mould in that ear caused my ear to readjust itself back to its natural shape whereas for the past 30 odd years of my life, it's had an ear mould in it constantly since my very first ear mould at 6months old.
1. The CI gave me a lot more information on the detail of the crunching sound, depth and the pitches.
2. The HA only gave me limited information, only gave me the overall crunching sound and no depth to the sound but it did give me the pitches of the crunchiness albeit on a lesser scale.
3. The HA simply amplified the sounds and transposed them down to the lower frequencies, thus distorting it slightly, any more amplification - turning the volume made the disortion worse - much to my surprise!
4. I found that the CI did not amplify or transpose them, it simply interpreted the sounds and sent it as electronic signal which my brain deciphered it as sound. If I turned the volume up slightly - it just made it louder without any loss of distortion but it was slightly uncomfortable.
Overall conclusionThe CI gave me a richer information input compared to the HA. I have been walking around with the CI for 6 months before I started to wear the HA on the unimplanted ear to keep it stimulated and it was then I realised that I was getting an awful lot out of the CI.
The benefit of having cochlear implant DO vary from person to person as their hearing loss and experiences varies among the CI recipients. It has been found that a few was not getting much benefit out of the CI and some found equal benefit as it was with their HA's and others say it surpasses the benefit that they had with the HA with the CI. If that makes sense?
I suspect I belong to the latter group even it's been only 6 months and what a rollercoaster ride it has been so far and I'm not regretting it for a single minute.
Right at this moment, I'm a little preoccupied with my HA mould because it is irritating unimplanted my ear after not wearing it for 6months. I reckon it's the time it's had without a mould in that ear caused my ear to readjust itself back to its natural shape whereas for the past 30 odd years of my life, it's had an ear mould in it constantly since my very first ear mould at 6months old.