Husband's hearing loss is driving me batty!

I opened this website just now and this OLD post popped up.

Sadly, we are not in a better place--his hearing is worse and now he watches TV with sound turned waaay up AND the closed captioning is on.

I have given up trying to help him. He can deal. Well, he can't, but I'm not owning the problem. He did have a fall at work a couple weeks ago b/c he could not hear the machine coming down the track and believe me, they are LOUD. He kind of jumped out of the way, but fell and sustained a serious cut to his hand. I have him as much sympathy as I felt was appropriate, and let it go.

Last Christmas all 5 of my kids told him what to get ME for Christmas: have his hearing checked and get SOMETHING to help him. Since he believed I set the kids up to do this, it made him even angrier.

I read that people with severe hearing loss are 5x more likely to develop "early onset" dementia. I don't know much about that, but he does seem to have dementia, the way he doesn't engage in normal conversation, then just jumps into the mix, since he can't hear, he looks like he's being kind of a jerk.

On the upside, I can mutter under my breath to myself and he can't hear.

This really made me sad, seeing a 2 yo post that didn't "get any better". It's actually a lot worse. (sigh)

My problem with my fiancé (65) and my roommate (61) is that both are on fixed incomes and cannot AFFORD hearing aids, even if they would consent to wearing them. Both are about 75% deaf in one ear and 25% deaf in the other. Meanwhile, like Midkid, I am surrounded by increasingly louder conversations, TV and music. I am 59 and am terrified I will become hard of hearing sooner than I might otherwise because of their requirements. Sometimes they accuse me of being moody because I don't talk much - a conversation shouldn't require every comment to be repeated 3 times!
A Fraidy Kat

cmag - there are a lot of reasons - just lazy, just not realizing how bad hearing really is - maybe having migraines aggravated - maybe uncomfortable - maybe just not right! worth checking with audiologist, maybe keep tabs on how often worn and not worn and go with them to appt.

I don't understand people who have hearing aids but do not wear them. My wife has them as do I, but she does not wear her's. Thus, the TV is blaring so loud that I can't hear her with my hearing aids on. It sometimes gets so bad that I leave the room, but I can still hear the TV.

I appreciate all the comments, but I have given up the fight on this one, for now anyway. Of course, his own mom is deaf as a post, refuses to wear her hearing aids and doesn't hear a dang thing. We are screaming at her, literally, and repeating ourselves over and over, and she's "what?" "Why does everyone but me have such poor diction?" Hubby will take her out to eat and I refuse to go--they scream at each other through the whole meal---and I am sitting there with a headache b/c of the utter ridiculousness of it. People can TELL when you can't hear, it's NOT a secret--and you look 10 years older than you are when you are CONSTANTLY talking "over people" and making inappropriate remarks in a conversation, simply b/c you cannot hear what's going on.

I keep hubby's ears clean of wax and do all I can. In the end, it's his problem. My kids have even spoken to him, 2 of them are Drs. and know what is out there and available, and he will not do a single thing to address the issue. Funny, he's mortified by how his mother acts, but he's exactly the same as her.

One idea my Dad and I came up with regarding my late Mom and her hearing loss was to whisper. And not put the TV volume on high [Mom never could learn to use the TV remote]. BINGO !! That worked, and Mom went to get hearing aids.

The hearing aids would work wonderful in the doctor's office but the next day nothing... oops, user error... Mom was afraid to push the ear piece all the way into her ear. Back to the doctor. Worked in the office, not the next day at home. Then 6 months later we were off to buy new and improved hearing aids. Rinse. Repeat.

The whispering also worked with Dad's own Mom half century ago who refused to wear hearing aids.

Cleaning wax out the ear would help Dad any time we noticed he wasn't hearing us. Mom refused to have hot water put in her ear more then once, she insisted on the nurse using luke warm... of course, that never worked on the wax. But to Mom, she had her ears cleaned... [sigh]

They are indeed fiddly little beggars, and every model has its own idiosyncrasies - how many beeps when the battery is low, which direction it needs wiggling in to sit comfortably, how badly it whistles if it's not in straight... And that's before you even start on the many and varied ways to drop them, lose them in your scarf, or take them out and leave them on the side of your plate... (oh mother how I miss you!)

I hope we are all paying attention, so that when the time comes we will remember that our deafness is a pain in the butt to other people too and that we need to sort ourselves out with effective devices and use them every day. I wonder if we will..?

Hearing aids, loud tv's! Batteries, volume level, adjustments so they can hear. Drove me nutty! Mom nor her hubby could hear the tv, he would turn it up, blaring. Then mom would complain that it was too loud. Also had her use headphones which worked well for awhile.

Then the move to a facility. He can now blare the tv as loud as he likes. Mom lost her hearing aids soon after the move, maybe during one of her outbursts. Twisted number 2 decided not to replace them, they would just get lost again, even though they are insured against loss for two years, so now mom can barely hear. Sure doesn't help with her ability to hear or understand a conversation. But, I think that skill is gone anyway.

Lesson? Do not buy new hearing aid for someone with dementia because they are moving. They will more than likely be lost. Staff cannot keep track of everybody's hearing aids.

Mid kid, I feel your pain. I went through this with my mother. When she watched tv, the volume was so loud that my husband, who is a bit of a pain, walked around with his hands over his ears! He complained to me that the TV was so loud that it interfered with his sleep. When I told him to ask her to turn it down, he said no he would never do that. But he made it clear that I had to do something about it.
I did talk with her about her hearing. She is 91 and when my stepfather was alive, she lived with his hearing loss and knows how hard it is on others. We got her fitted for expensive hearing aids with a 90 day return policy. In the hearing center she was very pleasant and was enthusiastic about how much better she heard. Well she was great for a few days and then stopped wearing them and said they made everything too loud. I took her back to have them adjusted and then she told me she heard the same with or without the hearing aids. They stayed in the case and she never tried them. So I started making her wear headphones when watching tv in common areas. She didn't like that much so she started isolating herself in her room. My husband still complained about how loud it was even with the door closed!
It was horrible and I finally took her back to return them. Instead of returning them, the technician traded them for a different kind that was easier to put on! The technician also gave me instruction on how to get her to wear them. This put more stress on me. She couldn't put them in or adjust the volume so that was a total disaster. At one point she said the volume was good and I later found out that they weren't even on! It was such a pain in the butt! I finally took them back and told the technician that she wasn't coming back in and as her power of attorney and medical surrogate, I was returning them for a refund!
I think that you will have to find other options for your husband because if he is going to be difficult, it will become a major source of conflict.

They make a few aids that are not official aids - and they may work as long as you don't just get dirt cheap ones that are nothing but amplifiers but something that will favor high pitched and speech sounds. MD Hearing aid comes to mind. Ebay has some others. If you spent 6K on aids that are not worth using, get back to the audiologist with them and see what is wrong or what adjustment can be made!

Thanks Churchmouse---for saying I'm not a nag. Hubby's VERY sensitive about the hearing loss--which I understood in his 30's, but by his mid-60's??? It's just crazy.
He is so stubborn and has told me "once and for all" he is NEVER having his hearing checked, he knows he's "slightly deaf" in one ear, but other than that he is FINE and quit talking about it.

Thanks for the "idea"--but it would be just like the gym memberships I got for the two of us. He did 20 minutes on the recumbent bike and pouted on the sofa for the remaining 40 minutes of my workout. Never went back.

This is a man who doesn't "hear" but who also doesn't "listen". These are 2 separate skills. He's beginning to plan for retirement and the FIRST step in that direction will be marriage counseling. We have no idea how to be alone together! Hopefully this will come up.

Hubby is on his second pair of $6000 hearing aids and still won't wear them!!!!!!!!
I also have hearing loss and hesitate to go and get hearing aids because my arthritis is so bad I would not be able to get them in and out. I do hear that there are now some that the audiologist puts in and you have to go and get them changed every three months. Maybe I will do that when I have no other Dr appointments and am missing the attention. I think Medicare pays for a hearing test every two years. Should get my teeth cleaned as well it has been a year. Won't bother with the Eye Dr though she won't do my cataracts because she says I am too much of an operative risk. I can still see to drive so that is the main thing.
Midkid just get hubby one of those old fashioned horns and hold it up to his ear when you need to say something.

I feel stressed just reading about your husband, Midkid; but really sad to read this last post. Don't give up hope or give up on him! - but I do honestly feel for you. It's partly knowing that hearing is about brain function as well as the ear itself, and the longer he leaves it untreated the harder it will be to restore. It's partly the mental scars of adolescence in a house where both parents were going deaf, and couldn't hear each other, and blamed one another for not speaking up - ugh!!! And it's also that one of my closest friends, and she's only around 60, just rang me in a panic to ask "what have you got? What's wrong?" "Sorry? What are you talking about?" I asked her. "Your voicemail, you said you've got something!" My mind went blank. Then I remembered: I'd called her on Wednesday, and Wednesday nights she goes swimming, every week. My message was "sorry, I forgot about swimming." This friend is getting increasingly annoyed with her husband, who's in his 70s, because he won't do anything about his deafness. But, so, what is it that she dreads so much that she won't listen when it comes to her own? I have gently tried to say something before now. She got very grumpy indeed so I left it.

About you being a nag... Nag, eh? Sigh.

No. A nag is a person who harps on endlessly and impatiently about trivial or insoluble grievances. Not someone who expresses her frustration about something that is not trivial, not insoluble, and is just as important to the person she's asking to do something as it is to her herself.

I don't suppose...

Would you consider booking his 'n' hers appointments at your local audiology centre and just springing it on him as part of a trip into town together? Lead him by example? The worst that could happen is that you get a clean bill of health and he sits in the car sulking.

Funny this popped up today---this is still a huge issue at home. I finally just moved out of our bedroom b/c he has to have the TV on 24/7 when he is home and it is LOUD. I have given up trying to get him to get help. He refuses and makes it be about me being a nag. Let him go deaf, He's missing the most wonderful sounds in the world--our grandkids little voices. He doesn't care who wears hearing aids, he will not now nor ever even try them. Period.

Having "the talk" with someone experiencing hearing problems can be uncomfortable for a lot of people. It's a very sensitive topic and a lot of the excuses you've experienced here are quite common amongst people who haven't quite accepted their hearing loss or come to terms with it yet.

Midkid, maybe it is time to give in; since he is essentially living as a deaf man just begin to treat him that way. Stop raising your voice to try to speak to him, and investigate doorbells, alarms and other devices geared toward the deaf community. It may distress him enough to seek help, if not at least it should relieve some of your frustration.

Even John Boy of the Waltons wears hearing aides. Richard Thomas (John Boy) has had serious hearing loss for many years.

Midkid58, search the internet for names of famous people from his generation who wear hearing aids.... maybe someone who he really liked.... example, Bill Clinton wears hearing aids now and same with singer Huey Lewis.

Thanks for the help! I was venting, I know, but he's only 63 and by no means in his dotage! I HAVE written down things on papers and held them up for him to see. He gets really, really angry when "bugged" about his hearing loss....but it is quickly becoming a real hot-button issue. I woke up this am with total laryngitis, I can't make a sound. So I WILL have to write down anything. I know that seeing his mom be so resistant to h/as and pretty much never wearing them....and the fact that our insurance doesn't cover the cost...PLUS he still thinks he 18....I think also if I get my kids on board to talk to him, esp the 2 who are drs.....THEM he will listen to!!!

There is a new hearing aid thatnfits entirely within the ear canal, nothing over tge top of the ear. These do not even have to be removed to shower or sleep. Maybe he would go along with that sort of device.

Tell him they have some wonderful hearing aides now that people actually like. My ex didn't want to get hearing aides. He was in his mid-60s. I encouraged (aka nagged) him, so he finally relented. After he got them, he wouldn't go anywhere without them. He didn't realize how much he had been missing out on.

It was easier on me, too. He didn't accuse me of mumbling and not talking plain after that. He was always mad at me for him not hearing. I was glad that I finally didn't have to get right in front of him so he could see me talk. Saved a lot of wear on my nerves. He went to Beltone. They were expensive, but worth it.

Sometimes I've just said "I'm not going to ruin my vocal chords and speak any louder." Period.

I have a feeling he wouldn't wear hearing aids if you did get them for him; he's probably by now used to not hearing ambient noise and that might be too distracting and upsetting.

Sounds silly but you could text him or write out your message, perhaps on a tablet rather than something larger.

I think this is a problem that a lot of people face b/c elders often just won't wear their hearing aids. After seeing my father struggle to get them out, I understand why. I was actually concerned they might be stuck in his ear.