This post talks about being Deaf and hard of hearing, communication, hearing fatigue, frustration, and what it is like trying to understand everything happening around me.

Being Deaf itself was never really the exhausting part for me. Being hard of hearing and trying to hear everything around me is what gets exhausting. There is a difference, and I do not think a lot of hearing people realize how much work can go into simply trying to understand one conversation.

When someone talks to me, I am not just hearing their voice. I am learning their voice, how they sound, how they pronounce certain words, and matching that sound to the way their lips move. At the same time, I am paying attention to everything else happening around me. Background noise, another person talking, repetitive sounds, machines, music, whatever is going on. My brain is constantly trying to figure out what sound belongs where and what I actually need to focus on.

I have learned people’s voices over time. Different people sound different, obviously, but for me, recognizing who a voice belongs to helps me understand them better. The same goes with repetitive sounds. If I already know what a sound is, my brain does not have to spend as much energy trying to figure it out every single time.

Lip-reading helps too, but it is not like I can stare at someone’s mouth and suddenly understand every word perfectly. I am matching the movement of their lips with the sound I am hearing, while also trying to tune out everything else around me. Sometimes that works really well. Sometimes it does not.

And yes, I ask people to repeat themselves.

I used to hate doing that. Years ago, there were moments where I would pretend I understood, smile, nod, or laugh along even though I had no idea what was said. Eventually, I got over being embarrassed about it because I realized something pretty simple: if I am going to communicate with you, I need to know what you actually said.

So if I ask you to repeat yourself, it is not because I was not paying attention. I am asking because I want to understand you correctly. Sometimes I may ask more than once. Sometimes I may need you to say it differently, write it down, or show me another way.

The part that bothers me is when people lose patience.

I have had people get frustrated with me because I did not understand them fast enough. That affects me a lot more than people probably realize because I have had traumatic experiences at home connected to people getting angry or impatient with me. When somebody suddenly gets an attitude because I cannot understand them, my brain does not always treat it like a small moment. It can connect to much older things.

I will always try my best to help someone communicate with me. I will ask questions, read lips, try to figure out what sound I missed, or use another way to understand. What I will not do anymore is tolerate someone lashing out at me because it took an extra minute.

Accents are another thing that can make hearing harder for me, and I want to make something clear here because I do not want anyone taking this the wrong way. There is absolutely nothing wrong with having an accent. Everybody talks differently. The difficult part for me is that the words may sound different from how I originally learned them, so my brain has to learn that version of the sound too.

I work with two people who have accents, and one of them has a pretty strong accent. At first, there were words I could not understand. He was very patient about it. If I did not know what he said, he would write the word down or even use his finger to spell the letters on the wall so I could see what he was saying. Once I saw the word, I understood it.

That is what I mean when I say there is always another way to communicate.

He did not act like I was stupid. He did not get mad because I could not hear him correctly. He just found another way to get the message across, and after spending more time around him, I started understanding his voice and accent better anyway.

Funny enough, I have my own accent too. People sometimes tell me I sound British because of what people call a Deaf accent, but that is probably another blog post because I could probably go on about that for a while.

When My Brain Finally Says Enough

After enough talking, background noise, lip-reading, voices, accents, and trying to figure everything out, I get tired. Sometimes I get headaches, which have developed into chronic migraines. Sometimes I get irritated, although most of the time I am more irritated at objects or whatever is happening around me than at the actual people.

There are moments when it becomes too much and I feel backed into a corner by sound. Too many voices, too much happening, too much for my brain to keep processing, and I eventually shut myself down because I need everything to stop for a while.

That is usually when I take my hearing aids out.

Taking them out gives me a break from everything around me, but I do not necessarily want complete silence. I usually put in my Gumy in-ear headphones because they are one of the few headphones loud enough for me to hear clearly, and I listen to music instead.

That probably sounds funny. I am exhausted from hearing, so my solution is to listen to music.

But it is different because I am controlling it.

I can choose what I hear, how loud it is, and what I am focusing on instead of having twenty different sounds fighting for my attention.

Then I usually go into my room, which is normally dark, with my three screens running for visual noise. I work on my projects, write my novels, design websites, or work on the website I built for my favorite actor. Doing that helps calm my brain because I am finally focused on something I actually want to focus on.

That is how I reset.

I Do Not Need You to Feel Sorry for Me

Another thing that happens a lot is people do not realize I am Deaf or hard of hearing when they first meet me. If I do not respond to them correctly, they may think I am ignoring them or that I just do not want to deal with them.

Then they find out I am Deaf and suddenly I hear, “Oh, I am sorry,” or the one that bothers me the most, “I am sorry to hear that.”

I understand that most people are trying to be kind when they say that, but it still bothers me because it makes it sound like being Deaf or hard of hearing is this horrible thing that happened to me and everybody should feel sorry for me.

I do not need anyone to feel sorry for me. In fact, I think that sympathy often complicates relationships and can create unnecessary tension. What I truly value is understanding and collaboration. I would much rather hear someone say, “Oh, I did not realize,” when they become aware of a situation I’m involved in. This acknowledgment can open a door to constructive dialogue.

Then, having the person work with me to find solutions or explore ideas together is far more beneficial. It shows that they are willing to engage with me, to listen actively, and to contribute positively to the situation at hand. That is it – a simple exchange of awareness and the willingness to collaborate can transform potentially awkward scenarios into opportunities for growth and connection.

If I did not understand what you said, repeat it. If repeating it does not work, write it down. Use your phone and type it into Notes. Face me when you are talking to me. Use gestures. Spell the word out. Try something visual.

For Deaf people, our eyes do a lot of work. We watch lips, facial expressions, gestures, body language, written words, and everything else happening around us. We are completely capable of understanding what is going on. Sometimes the only thing that needs to change is the way the information is being given to us.

That is probably the biggest thing I want hearing people to understand.

Do not dismiss someone because they did not hear you the first time. Do not assume they are ignoring you. Do not get angry because you have to repeat yourself.

There is almost always another way to communicate.

Paper still exists. Phones exist. Notes apps exist. Fingers can spell things. You can point at something. You can face someone so they can read your lips.

Communication does not have to stop just because hearing is difficult.

Have patience with us and we will usually find a way to understand each other.

Leave a Reply