be, being, been, is, was, were, am, are

[digitS']

No, I had problems.


By 15, I had a 30 decibel hearing loss. I guess that if you have normal hearing and want to know what "loss" means, double the sound for 10, triple it for 20 ... etc. I never had much interest in what it all meant.

Comprehension meant something to me. (Even if I had to make up 99% of it !) Maybe someone should have realized that it would be a progressive loss and encouraged me to learn sign language. I don't know. I notice the same withdrawal in those who do use sign but - they have company . Me. I'm curious and know that I share that with linguists, including those interested in sign.

Steve

 

[Zeedman]

By 15, I had a 30 decibel hearing loss. I guess that if you have normal hearing and want to know what "loss" means, double the sound for 10, triple it for 20 ... etc. I never had much interest in what it all meant.

Comprehension meant something to me. (Even if I had to make up 99% of it !) Maybe someone should have realized that it would be a progressive loss and encouraged me to learn sign language. I don't know. I notice the same withdrawal in those who do use sign but - they have company . Me. I'm curious and know that I share that with linguists, including those interested in sign.

Steve

So @digitS' , does that mean I should be typing harder?

Kidding aside, that is a lot of hearing loss to occur at so early an age. Was there noise exposure involved?

I lost a little hearing during my time in the Service, working around airplanes. For years I thought it was nothing major... that I just couldn't hear bats & ultrasonic alarms anymore (I could hear them as a tween). Now that I work where there is a hearing conservation program, I realize I lost 10-15 dB in the higher frequencies.

 

[digitS']

Type Harder, @Zeedman !

Better yet, sit where I can see you communicating. I'll read your digitS' .

I had the 2 types of measles as a kid. The first time, I was very young. Mom said that I had normal hearing before that. It was a long slide and I reached the "severe" stage in my early 40's.

Of course, it interferes with day to day life. The drier runs merrily along in the utility room and I don't hear the beeps that it's done. More seriously, if you miss your coat pocket and drop your keys, will you hear them hit the ground? My "profoundly" deaf neighbor dropped her keys in a parking lot and had her car stolen.

The biggest problem in my life is human voice comprehension. Even if people are speaking directly to me, I have problems. Extrapolate and Interpolate I guess that I learned to read lips and body language from long experience. It isn't enough.

I remember as a kid deciding that popular kids knew what was going on around them. They seemed to have good awareness of personal interactions in a group.

We all have limits. We all also have interests. Simply knowing that I'm missing something doesn't explain all of mine but that is a sizable part of it.

Steve