I can't hear you

It's hard to fully understand what it's like to be unilaterally/single-sided deaf (SSD) until it happens to you. Before surgery, I had 60-70% of my hearing, and it worked ok. I couldn't use the phone on that side very well, unless I wanted to ask the person on the other side to repeat themselves several times, but I was able to hear the tv and understand people talking in person.

These days, as I am returning to my normal activities, I have been watching out for different situations where being SSD could be a hindrance. So far, nothing horrible has happened due to my inability to hear out of my left ear; I haven't accidentally agreed to something I would usually never do, such as wear a puffy pirate shirt to an interview with Matt Lauer on the Today show. I do, however, have a few stories that exemplify what it's like to live with single-sided deafness.

The first one is that my husband is constantly ending up on the "wrong" side of me. I guess we've always naturally positioned ourselves when walking so that I am on the right and he's on the left; unfortunately, I can't hear him if we're like that, so we have to do the "SSD shuffle" frequently.

Also, when walking on a sidewalk, I've noticed that I always hear people coming up behind on my right side, even though they're on my left. It's not possible that they're trying to pass me on the right since I'm already to the right side of the sidewalk, so I have to remember to just stay where I am. Dogs, bicycles, and runners have all startled me by suddenly appearing where I didn't hear them.

Last week, when I went to a happy hour with my friend, the room was pretty crowded. She and I were sitting at the bar, where she was on my right side, and then a small group of people started standing right behind us. Before that, I had been able to hear her just fine, since her voice projects pretty well, but once the people behind us started talking loudly, my one ear had difficulty discerning which voice it was supposed to listen to. Normally, both ears would focus on the appropriate sound and block out the background noise. Instead, my brain and eyes had to seriously concentrate on what she was saying so that I could hear her instead of the other girl.

All in all, these situations have not been insurmountable, though my patience at times has worn thin. I have to remember that my hearing is not going to suddenly snap back to how it was and that these are going to be lifetime issues. I guess we'll just see how it goes.