Thursday, August 23, 2007

Growing up Deaf - Part 6

Getting hearing aids - Part 1

My first hearing aids were body aids, which I got shortly after my hearing loss diagnosis. Mine was a single body aid with a splitter cord, held in a pocket or under the shirt via harness. It got annoying after some years of receiving stares from people who were wondering what that thing was. Was it a radio or something else? Mish's hilarious A Peek into My Childhood: 'Portable Radio' blogpost makes me wonder why I didn't think of doing the radio trick.

There were those who didn't know any better, and thankfully were few, who just yanked the things from my ears. "What's this? *YANK* *squealing from earpiece*"

You often had to make sure you weren't dribbling liquids the wrong way when drinking or eating. Did they ever make protective shields for this kind of thing? The alternative was usually to take them off and put them elsewhere, put it upside down in a shirt pocket, clip it upside down on your shirt, or something else. If you did get something in there, you'd be blowing and sucking on the microphone or something else. How would it look and sound if you did just that to a regular microphone out there just to demo on? Then there'd be the times I'd gross out some people by putting the cord in my mouth.

Back in first grade, all the kids had their body aids replaced by FM aids, which were used only in the classroom. For some strange reason, I went nuts, refusing to let the teacher swap them out, crying and acting up. She finally got it on me. About the only song I remember them playing through the system was something called "P. Mooney". It went something like this...

"I'm a whee, I'm a whoo, I'm P. Mooney."

Has anyone out there heard of this song? How did you deal with rude people about your hearing aids including those who threatened to or actually did cut the cords?

Next - part 2 of Hearing Aids.

4 comments:

Dianrez said...

They hung aids on me, too, in a mainstream school despite my being so deaf that they were useless shrieking boxes.

If anybody messed with the aids or cords, I would simply let the earpeices fall out and innocently go about my business, apparently unaware of the shrieking feedback from the hanging things causing people to go crazy.

The aids were soon left alone and in good time, nobody bugged me about why they weren't being worn.

Def Fresh Meat said...

*blushes*

RSGeo, I was pleasantly surprised to see a mention of my vlog in your post. The radio trick came to me just because of my babysitter. He was a metal head and was always rocking out to songs through his headphones every time he watched me and my siblings. Isn't it funny how little things they do impact us?

Yes, I had few incidents where they yanked the earpieces. I was a child with overactive imagination so I pretended to be in pain and staggered across the hallway "owwwww owwwwww". Freaked them out and they left me alone since then haha.

FM aids, were they the ones where the teacher wore the transmitter and microphone with us wearing the receivers? I am trying to remember. If so, ah yup! I have had that too. It did not work for me.....all I heard was the shrieking noise and could not make out the sounds. But they made me wear it everyday. The song "P.Mooney" sounds very familiar. Hmmmmm....they also played the nursery rhyme songs, I remember. Did they play those for you as well?

Children were gullible so they fell for few acts I put on while wearing body aids, lol. That's how I dealt with rude people. Radio trick, pretended pain, FBI or UFO trick, and many more. I know, I know....I was a weird kid. ;)

Looking forward to part 2. :) Keep it coming!

Robert G said...

Hello, Mish! Thanks for making it here. I had seen you in DeafRead, and just had to make mention of it. Part two of the hearing aid thing is in Part 7 of Growing up Deaf.

Just consider us part of the Weird Kid Klub.

Yep, those were the FM aids, and the entire classroom was wired for it. I think they also played the occasional nursery rhyme songs. I'm hoping someone out there can remember the P. Mooney lyrics and maybe have the song somewhere. I'd like to hear it again.

ASL Risen said...

Wow, interesting about your part 6!
Well, I remembered that my mom was so furious with me for NOT wearing my hearing aids at home during the summer time. I got so FED UP with my mom forcing me to wear both hearing aids. I did told my mom that I got so tired of my neighbors MADE FUN of my 4 breasts while I wore 2 hearing aids bra and they did insulted me about 2 strings that had to carry my 4 breasts!