5 Years

It was five years ago today.  I lay looking at bright lights, keenly aware of the medical hustle and bustle in my peripheral vision.

Aren't they going to be drilling a hole in my skull soon?  Should I even be awake to realize I'm in the operating room?

These were my final thoughts before I went under anesthesia and officially turned bionic.

April 18, 2012: The day I got a cochlear implant.

Looking back, it should have felt like a big deal.  I hadn't heard "normally" since I was nine, or perhaps not ever-- not that it mattered how long I had been hearing impaired.  For most of my life, it was difficult to make sense of sound.  The age of nine carries particular significance given I was that age when the school nurse told my parents something wasn't quite right.  It was then, I started to feel different.

In the months that followed, which turned to years, I occasionally sunk into a world of self-pity which varied from moments to hours, at least internally.  On the outside, I was social, cheerful, and dare I say, confident, but on the inside...  I look back and... I was a mess.

In the decade that preceded April 18, 2012, I struggled all day every day.  I worried my kids would call for help and I wouldn't answer.  I agonized over whether I'd advance in my career, questioning how a person so hearing impaired could possibly rise to the top, or even at all.  I cried after seeing friends and family, believing I was incapable of  connecting with others, too focused on trying to understand what people were saying to me to build the deep friendships I craved.  I was tired, and beyond frustrated.  Even my sweet husband knew there was nothing he could say or do to ease my pain.  I'm a "talk-through-things" kind of girl, and there have only been select times when I was so pissed, I couldn't speak.  

It was always my hearing.

I likened it to the worst possible circumstance you could wish upon your enemy, a prison that swallowed and taunted with its suffocating grip.   I despised it so much, that to cope, I pretended it wasn't happening.  I did everything in my power- all of my focus and energy-  to avoid having to publicly acknowledge the haunting existence of my hearing impairment.  It was exhausting.

By 2012, I only heard 15-20% around me.  So when I got the audiologists' green light to go through with a cochlear implant, it felt like a new chapter... at least, sort of.  But it was never just about the hearing.  There was an even bigger deal. 

For me, it occurred April 1, 2012.

Prior to then, I rarely spoke a word about my hearing loss.  I had incidents when others would ask me about it- my child's pediatrician, an attorney when we closed on our first home- and I'd freeze in a bubble of shame.  I couldn't even respond without crying.

But finally, I spoke. 

The truth is I had drafted my first blog post in snippets here and there throughout many years.  In notebooks and journals, and post-its I scribbled my truth.  But it was April 1, 2012 that I was brave enough to share.

I wish I could describe to you what it felt like for me to finally let go of trying to hide something that was so persistent and shameful.  There was a weightlessness to that moment, a vulnerability, sure, but it was coated in freedom, as if a wall of bricks that surrounded my body had finally been knocked down after twenty two years.  The cries that poured out of me after I pushed PUBLISH was the most cathartic and powerful moment I've ever experienced in my life.

Fast forward to seventeen days later when a surgeon was slicing into my head... that wasn't such a big deal.  Being myself was.

Five years has passed, and my life has surely changed.  It's been an incredible journey, and there's too much that has happened to put it all into a single blog post.  Maybe soon, I'll share more.

To summarize, at least hearing-wise, I have amazing days, some where my understanding of sound is so crisp and clear, I feel like I'm dancing when I walk.  Whoo!  Those are happy days.

In between, there are absolutely shitty days where it seems I'm surrounded by chaos, like hundreds of people gargling at once- no joke- and those days make me want to throw my implant processor out the window, have a good cry, go to bed, and start again the next morning. And the next day, maybe it's better.

A cochlear implant is not a cure by any means.  The bionic world I experience-- well, it's life, filled with ups and downs, surprises and disappointments-- but it's truthful.

THAT'S where the success story lies: the truth.

On my 5 years + 17 days anniversary of living my life-  my real, God-given journey- I look to you and pray you'll do the same.  I pray that if you have something- and we all do- that you'll experience the surrender I'm unable to justifiably describe, knowing that one day you will reach the point where you'll look back and say, My GOD, why didn't I do that sooner?

And yes, it will be a big deal.   But in time, as the glare of exposure dims, you may even come to embrace and honor and grow to love the crazy deal that's true to you.  My prayer is that you'll own it, because it's yours.

Life Whispers

Life has been whispering to me over the course of the last year.

I've known that I have been holding my truth too closely. I've known I should share my stories once more. But like many of life's journeys, the longer I let it go, the stronger the case was for me not to return. It seemed too hard, too much, to write any more about my hearing journey.

My life, and its inclusion of progressive hearing loss, has offered its share of intense frustration. Then there was the introduction of my cochlear implant in 2012, and the shiny hope attached to it that life would quickly get better. And then... there was its aftermath with its own frustrations, and the disappointment when I didn't hear the way I assumed I would.

Through the tears and tantrums, the pity parties, and the anger over not being able to hear “normally,” I have never doubted that this journey is exactly the life I am supposed to be living. From the time I was a child, I instinctively grasped that while I often resented my circumstances, it was a journey meant for me. I suspected purpose behind it all.

When I started this blog almost three years ago, that purpose became more clear. Sharing who I was- the good, the bad, and the vulnerable- seemed to strike a chord in people. I began connecting with family, friends and even strangers in a more meaningful way, and because I opened up, I found others did the same with me.

In 2013, I remember my husband, kids and I driving to the ocean for summer vacation. I received a message from a mother whose son was born with a developmental difference. She shared her hopes that in spite of his challenges, he would be able to confidently approach his life and accomplish his goals. She revealed she was also printing my blog posts and saving them for her little boy to one day read. Slumped in the passenger seat, I read her message over and over again. I was so incredibly moved, crying quietly to myself for miles as we drove down the coastline.

I felt as though my journey- and the sharing of it- was making a difference. It energized me. It freed me. It encouraged a greater acceptance and self-potential than I knew I could reach.

And then I stopped. A busy life got in the way.

Skydiving, Lake George. August 2013.

Those whispers-- they would come to me in life's more interesting moments. The time I jumped out of an airplane and couldn't hear a thing. The first time I saw a play and understood everything. The time I finally mustered enough courage to ask for closed captioning glasses at the movie theater, only to have them NOT work (resulting in free tickets- much to my kids' amusement- for a future visit). The time I tried again, and for the first time in ages, actually understood and enjoyed a movie. The time I was accepted into a research study at Vanderbilt University, and worked with the best in the audiology world to achieve better hearing. The time my sister, also living with progressive hearing loss, pursued a cochlear implant and how her results differed from mine.

Enthusiastically posing during Visit 1 at Vanderbilt University, Nashville.  July 2014.

Each time, a quiet thought would pass through: You should write about that, Pam.  And for a moment, I thought I would, only to distract myself with life's busy excuses once more.

Then 2015 introduced itself rather loudly.

I had a lovely reunion with my childhood friends, one who hadn't seen me since I received the cochlear implant. It's always fun to gather others' feedback as to how they perceive I am hearing, and I was pleased she commented on how much better I seemed to speak and understand. But she was also mad at me. She had loved the blog, and felt it had helped people. She was pissed at me for stopping.

The whispers were growing louder.

Immediately following the start of the new year, a dear friend of mine revealed a truth that was a long time in the making, plaguing this person's life with unnecessary exhaustion and secrets. Remembering my own big reveal, and the anxiety as to how people would respond, I can't even begin to express how happy it made me to see someone I love finally choose a life of greater authenticity. And then I questioned if mine was still in that category, or if I was masking my disability once more...

A couple of weeks later, I learned a college friend had tragically lost his life in a car crash. I didn't know Jason especially well- we shared a few classes at Syracuse, and lived near one another in our freshman dorm- but I knew enough to know he was a nice person. Through Facebook and mutual friends, I knew he had a good job, a beautiful wife he adored, a sweet 1 year old baby... he appeared to be a good guy living a good life. He was just 4 days older than me, a fact I did remember from the drunken birthday celebrations during college life. In the week following his death, I found myself wide awake one night, mourning for his wife, son, and parents, acknowledging the fleetingness of this life-- how often we save things for another time, only to never get there. I knew I wanted to write again, and I also knew I should.

A few days before my 34^th birthday, I received an email from a stranger named Joan. She had found my blog about a month after receiving a cochlear implant, and was struggling with painful “zapping” following activation, as if someone was flicking her head each time a noise presented itself. It actually took me a minute to remember my own experiences with this-- those moments a coworker would cough and it felt as though someone was snapping a rubber band at my temples. Reading Joan's pleas to provide her with hope, I felt grateful. I had come so far. If all other instances were whispers, this occurrence was a loud smack in the face. It was a blessing to connect with Joan. I needed to write again, to share again, to connect once more.

I have yet to determine what will come from this post, and any follow-ups to it, but I trust that sharing these thoughts with you is what I should be doing at this point in time. My life has always been richer when I share it. And I nod to my whispers- my dear friend starting fresh, Jason, Joan, and all the others leading to this exact moment. 

When life whispers, it can be tough to listen. But I should in this journey, and I commit to trying harder.

-  This post is dedicated to Jason Anderson.