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<\/p>\nFor most people, hearing is like breathing or blinking. It\u2019s something that happens so naturally and effortlessly that it\u2019s often taken for granted. For people with hearing loss, however, the seemingly simple act can be downright exhausting.<\/p>\n
Debra Salomonson is one such person. She was born with a hereditary hearing loss, the same as her father and grandfather. By age 28 she was already wearing hearing aids, but for years, she always felt as if her hearing could still be better.<\/p>\n
Outside of the home, where she was unfamiliar with speech patterns, Debra found it difficult to understand what people were saying. The situation worsened over time and recently became acute \u2013 and quite draining \u2013 for the 69-year-old retiree.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf someone invites me to a cocktail party or dinner or something, I\u2019ll be fine for about two hours, and no one would think anything is wrong,\u201d she explains. \u201cBut when I get home and into the next morning, I\u2019ll feel like I got hit by a truck. Sometimes I can barely even function the next day because I\u2019m so fatigued. And it\u2019s because all of every ounce of my being, is so engaged trying to decipher what\u2019s being said that it leaves me exhausted.\u201d<\/p>\n
Debra recently shared her concern regarding this problem with an audiologist, Drianis Duran, AuD, at Gulf Coast Audiology in Fort Myers. Debra wasn\u2019t the first person to visit Dr. Duran wondering what, if anything, could be done for the issue.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I told Debra is that we hear not just with our ears, but with our brain,\u201d Dr. Duran educates. \u201cYes, we use our ears to hear, but we also use our eyes to pick up on visual cues, read lips and do something that we call speech reading.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe do this naturally, but for people who have hearing loss, there are several parts of their brain \u2013 the auditory cortex, the visual cortex \u2013 that are working so hard to put all of this information together that it literally exhausts them.<\/p>\n
For someone with hearing loss who spends the day in a noisy environment, it\u2019s even worse.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose people are constantly bombarded with noise, and by the end of the day, they\u2019re not only exhausted, the only thing they want to do is sit in silence,\u201d Dr. Duran explains.<\/p>\n
Debra can certainly relate to that. She and her husband used to own and operate a small but busy restaurant. At the end of each day, all Debra wanted was peace and quiet. She was that way even in retirement, but Dr. Duran has helped her immensely.<\/p>\n
By fitting her with new hearing aids that allow her to control sounds in noisy or crowded environments and directly stream audio from a TV, computer or smartphone, Debra is feeling less exhausted.<\/p>\n
\u201cDebra is not only hearing better, she\u2019s hearing effortlessly now,\u201d Dr. Duran reports. \u201cAs a result, she\u2019s less exhausted at the end of the day, so she\u2019s enjoying life and engaging with others more.\u201d<\/p>\n
Debra alertly agrees.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese new hearing aids have been a game-changer for me,\u201d she enthuses. \u201cThey\u2019re working great, so I have Dr. Duran to thank for all she\u2019s done for me. She\u2019s very proactive with her patients, and I\u2019m benefitting from that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For most people, hearing is like breathing or blinking. It\u2019s something that happens so naturally and effortlessly that it\u2019s often taken for granted. For people with hearing loss, however, the seemingly simple act can be downright exhausting. Debra Salomonson is one such person. She was born with a hereditary hearing loss, the same as her…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":531,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","schema":"","fname":"","lname":"","position":"","credentials":"","placeID":"","no_match":false,"name":"","company":"","review":"","address":"","city":"","state":"","zip":"","lat":"","lng":"","phone1":"","phone2":"","fax":"","mon1":"","mon2":"","tue1":"","tue2":"","wed1":"","wed2":"","thu1":"","thu2":"","fri1":"","fri2":"","sat1":"","sat2":"","sun1":"","sun2":"","hours-note":"","locid":"","rating":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":535,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529\/revisions\/535"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gulfcoastaudiology.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}