[Clutz]

I've had problems with my hearing since I was pretty litle. I had over a half dozen surgeries on my ears inserting tubes, and in one case, repairing a ruptured ear drum (ouch!), so my hearing was never amazing. As long as I could remember, I had a hard time hearing out of my left ear. For example, when walking into the wind, I could hear the wind whistle in my left ear, but it was dead silent in the right. When I sleep on my left side, I can't hear my wife trying to wake me up if I am sleeping. But then about a two weeks ago it started getting worse, to the point where I was almost 100% deaf in that ear. I could put an earphone in my left ear and I could hear it even with the iPod volume turned down to zero- but in my right ear, I could only make out the faintest of sounds with the volume turned up to the max. I was really concerned, so I went to a walk in clinic on campus. They said I had a lot of wax in my ears, and that I'd have to go to a full doctors office to have that treated. I made an appointment and went in, and that office removed a lot of extremely hard wax. It was quite painful when they removed it actually, and my hearing returned- for the most part. It still wasn't where it was a few weeks before, but the improvement was dramatic. The doctor at that office gave me a prescription for ear drops and said if my hearing didn't improve a lot over the weekend I should make an appointment with a specialist. Monday morning rolled around, and I still couldn't hear properly out of that ear. I made an appointment with a specialist for today- but I didn't think they were going to be able to do much. Like I said, at this point my hearing was present, but not as good as it had been only a few weeks earlier.

So this afternoon I went to my appointment with the ENT. He did a simple hearing test with something that looked like a tuning fork and concluded I had serious hearing loss in that ear. What he did is ring a tuning fork in my ear, and then had it placed against my head and asked which was louder. I told him it was much louder against my head, and he said that it shouldn't be- and he repeated it with my left ear (the good one). This time it was *much* louder in my ear than touching my head. He cleaned a lot more wax out of my ear using suction, re-did the test, but there was still a bunch of hearing loss. So he sent me to see the audiologist in his office who did a bunch of tests, and concluded that there is pressure behind my ear drum. We then did a hearing test, and the hearing in my left ear is good. I can hear sounds as quite 5-10dB in that ear- and it's pretty flat across the spectrum that they looked at.

In my right ear, my threshold was at around 20-30 dB, depending on the frequency. Then they repeated the hearing test on my right side using bone conduction, and I had totally normal levels of 'hearing' with the bone conduction device.

Now the amazing thing to me is that, I can't remember ever being able to hear things this quietly. I heard the wind in my right ear this afternoon, which was amazing. He gave me a few prescriptions to take over the next week, and then I'm going back in for a follow up. If my hearing isn't within the normal range, then I'm going to have surgery on my ears- possibly to have a tube put in- but mayb to have the ear drum replaced, because mine is so scarred.

I can't imagine being able to hear better than I can now. I used to rely so heavily on my left ear for hearing, that hearing out of my right ear again is amazing. When I'd listen to stuff like Radiohead, I'd listen to the song with the headphones on both ways (L to L, R to R, and L to R, and R to L) so that I could hear what was happening in both channels.

I'm just amazed!

 

[Drag0n]

Wow, thats crazy. Im glad they can get some hearing back for you, and hopefully will get more back so you can enjoy more music.
Id like to get my ears professionally cleaned some time.
Ive tried the kits before, but i dont know how well they do.

Good Luck with it!

 

[logwed]

Congratulations. I can't even imagine partial deafness.

 

[bhjazz]

I'm really happy for you. You are truly lucky. But take care of that hearing now. All the simple rules you read...use them. Your hearing deteriorates as you age, but if you're careful you can help it last a bit longer.

 

[cyberidd]

Congratulations! It truly is a gift to have good hearing. I hope that the medication works without you having to go for surgery.

 

[Joelby]

Glad to hear this! Hearing is really a blessing.

 

[-=Germania=-]

Clutz, I dunno what age you are....

I had the SAME problems.
I had lots of ear-aches when I was a child and ear infections.
Then I had semi-permanent tubes put into both ears, the right ear became in normal range. The left ear never really got there and I had noticed that my hearing had been getting worse and worse in that ear.

Well, they thought that the problem was an occlusion on one of my bones in my middle ear or that the bones were stuck together. Due to the tiny nature of the bones, there was no way to tell this and unnessecary head X-Rays are generally frowned upon. Well, I went into the middle ear surgery and as it turned out, the bones in my middle ear had been severely worn against each other likely due to some sort of birth defect. The were able to reconstruct two fo the bones and then replace the middle bone with a synthetic one. Then they put this contraption right behind my eardrum that they said "aids" the artificial bones. I don't ask questions.

All I know is that since Sept. '07 my hearing has never been better and continues to get better. The doc said that I should hear improvements for the next 3-4 years given the near perfect status of my nerve and ear drums. Lucky me, at 22 years old, I still have the auditory nerves of a toddler.

They think that down the road, the possibility of it happening on the right ear is there. Still hear great in that ear, so no worries there!

If you need to get middle ear bone sugury, I HIGHLY Reccomend Dr. Lionetti of Loyola. His bedside manner is impeccable and the couple of doctors visits before were quick and pleasant.