noise? what noise?

One of the things that I was worried about, at the beginning of this whole process, was making the transition from the extremely quiet world I've been living in for fifteen to twenty years to a much louder one.  

I wasn't used to being able to hear, and though I had to work at it in order to function on a professional level, when I wasn't at work I just more or less embraced the silence.  I came to dislike sudden loud noises.   I never even tried to hear movies or TV or the radio (not that it would have done any good to try, of course) or the telephone.  I just lived in an increasingly quiet world.  

I never knew that my cat Spike actually meows really loudly (and insistently, though he's never all that clear on what it is he's insisting on).  I never heard my kitchen clock.  Never heard all kinds of things that I've since been rediscovering with my CI.

And I'm learning that it's not really something that I should have feared.  It seems odd, but I'm starting to regard having the processor on as normal, and when I take it off it's TOO quiet.  

And I'm finding that I want the other ear done so I can hear from both sides.  Not only for the volume, but because my two ears will work together to hear in an integrated way that hasn't been possible for me since - I don't even know when.  Ever, almost.

It's amazing.  I never realized the extent to which I was retreating to my quiet little world.  I suspect my husband could have told you.  But all that's receding now.

This is cool.