Now, where was I?

First of all, I must apologise for my absence just when things were starting to get a bit juicy. There are a few reasons why I haven’t been blogging and I suspect that readers can relate to them:

1. My personality type is not suited to blogging. I get really enthusiastic about things, persist for a while and then let them just fizzle out. To be a good blogger requires greater self-discipline and persistence than I have.
2. When I can’t hear well, I can think of nothing but how badly I can hear. It gets me down and I feel the need to get things off of my chest. When I can hear relatively easily, I appreciate it so much that I don’t spend every waking moment fretting about or dwelling on my deafness. In short, I have managed to improve my hearing aid programs and a huge weight has been eased off of my shoulders. Being released from prison probably feels much the same. I have been enjoying life so much that I have had little time for anything else.
3. So much happened in a short space of time concerning this project that I felt unable to document it in a logical sequence. I still can’t. So you will just get bits of the jigsaw puzzle here and there. You can assemble the puzzle yourself. I will try not to give you too many bits from some other jigsaw puzzle!

More posts are coming but here’s a brief summary of where I am up to:

• I spent something like 75 hours programming my hearing aids. It was a trial and error process as I learned my way around the software. There were highs and lows – progress was in both directions.
• My hearing is far better now than it has been over the last five years. My head is not in a bucket anymore. I am enjoying music and birdsong all over again. I can’t tell you quite how great that feels.
• I have a great sense of empowerment, liberation and freedom; at last I have some control over my situation.
• I’m more convinced than ever that do-it-yourself programming is the right way to go. I fully intend to make sure that I can continue programming my hearing aids into the future.
• The job still isn’t done. Programming is surprisingly exhausting and I need a break in which to gather the strength to make further adjustments.
• As well as the hardware and software, you also need to have an experimental attitude and patience. Buckets of it.
• If you’re thinking about trying to program your own hearing aids, stop wasting time! Do it! I sincerely wish that I had bought the gear five years ago and I wholeheartedly recommend the approach. It might not work for you but that’s a risk that’s probably worth taking.