Hearing loss driving me crazy. Any advice?

I'm a member of that club too. My 100 year old mother is profoundly deaf. We just ordered new hearing aids, again, as she keeps losing them. Her hearing is selective, often she doesn't really listen or says "what" and then you sigh, and she says "I heard that"! To make it worse, my spouse has needed hearing aids for the past three years and is still procrastinating. I am so sick of repeating myself, translating what the waitress says, and worst of all the loud tv. Yes, it makes you really really angry when you know there is help for it and they instead blame you for "mumbling" or talking when your back is turned, or some other excuse.

My mother says "Wha...?" to most everything I say. Usually she doesn't hear me, so I have to repeat a time or two. The worst is when she said she did hear me and tells me she didn't know why she said wha... I figure it is just to drive me a little crazier. Really, I know it's habit and the time it takes to process what I said.

Ha! My mom and her hearing loss drives EVERYONE nuts. Same problem with the excessive ear wax build-up and the latest hearing aid she has is so hard for 88 year old mom to figure out. It has 3 modes intended for different circumstances, but only one of the modes actually "works" for her. She can barely find and feel the control button, so she rarely gets to the mode that works! I finally asked the hearing aid doctor to reprogram the darn thing so only the mode that "works" is presented. But she still forgets to put it in and "loses" it all of the house -- treasure hunt for it is a routine part of the day. Her care workers now schedule cleaning of her ears, the aid, replace the batteries, the filters, etc, every Monday morning. That has helped keep the hearing aid "working". Now if we could just get her to actually use it, we'd only have to repeat ourselves 100 times...so frustrating!!!

Yes, yes, yes. My father refused to get one and we all catered to him. Now my mother is to the point where I have to repeat what I say (which makes me see red) at least once. there are situations where she doesn't even hear me speak and I am 2 feet away from her. My biggest fear is that something is going to happen to her and she will call out for me and I won't be able to hear her because the TV is too loud or something like that. sigh

Aggravating isn't it? My 96 yo mother is the same way. She is in a nursing home and she wheels way over in front of you in order to hear. AND she mishears and gets things all mixed up. I swear that i am going to start having my hearing checked regularly. People avoid her, because they can't converse with her.

Well the new hearing aids - depending on their severity of loss - are so small that you cannot see them, and the audiologist tells me that many boomer age doctors in my town get them so the patient doesn't know.
It drives me crazy too. We have went through three hearing aids in about five years and she still hates it and constantly fusses about it. Half the time the battery is out so then it is our fault because we 'mumble.' When the TV is on, she hears nothing at all. She will not stand in front of the mirror to put it on, so it is half hanging out and that ' is the fault of the company who made this rotten thing!'

I have also had strangers give me dirty looks in the store when I am talking loud or repeating things.

Raising my hand here, too. My Mom and her ever failing hearing. But she is her own worse enemy as the hearing aid places [she's been to two so far] are telling her that she needs to get the wax cleaned out of her ears..... she refuses the hot water and refuses the ear drops. Now the wax has concreted itself to the inside of her ears and only surgery would fix it, but at 97 that's not an option.

Then Mom blames the new hearing aid as the reason she can't hear.... now she wants to go to a 3rd hearing aid place. Mom can hear maybe one word out of 20, thus talking on the phone is a real challenge. Like if I say "jello" her brain translates it as "yellow" or "pillow".

Love my hearing aid! Maybe if the person needing them had gotten that taken care of when younger? I do think they should be purchased thru an audiologist at an ENT. I have 2 brother-in-laws younger than I, but are so vain they would rather drive us all crazy. One even comments, "I can't even see your aids". Duh, well go get your hearing taken care of!

P.S. freqflyer: um, ewww...cemented earwax? What a visual! My Dad and uncle had the same problem and they would take turns using a water-pik to clean out their ears. They would make an evening out of it.

zookeeper. I had to laugh, not that its funny, just that my mother is the same. She has lost hers at least 3 times, doesn't clean them enough so they break down (another trip for me to the aid place) She peels the tabs off them, dumps them all together and often puts the dead one back in with the rest. Today we were back to get a new set - another $3500. This time she is getting behind the ear type because her hearing is soooooooooo bad. I pray she can figure them out as she is slowly losing ability to even work the tv remote. Fortunately we just moved her to AL, so I'm going to ask the caregivers to do the same, help her put them in, change batteries and take them at night so she doesn't lose the darn things again.