On Being Deaf

Last Friday, when I woke up in the morning, I couldn’t hear out of my left ear. That side of my head was stone deaf. Nothin’.

There was no pain or other symptoms, so I didn’t think I had an infection. I figured it might be wax in my ear canal, so I bought some over-the-counter wax remover. I used the drops Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, but nothing came out of my ear. And still on Monday, I was deaf in that ear.

Not hearing anything with one ear is very disconcerting. Of course it was difficult to understand someone talking to me, especially if they were on my left side. But everything, in general, was muffled and garbled. Any kind of background noise made picking up specific sounds extremely difficult.

I became jumpy of the world around me. A person would suddenly appear beside me, seemingly out of nowhere because I couldn’t hear them approach. While driving, I’d hear a sound that I couldn’t immediately recognize or locate the source, and it would startle me.

Noise up close to my right (good) ear, like from my boys talking or shouting beside me, came in much louder and shriller than normal, and it almost hurt. I also found it difficult to judge my own speaking volume.

I was annoyed and bothered by the half-deafness over the weekend, but on Monday it really showed itself as a disability. I was in a local mall to look at some furniture I was sent to inspect, and I just couldn’t understand the salespeople speaking to me.

With the background noise of people moving and talking, and the overhead music, and the generally bad acoustics of the shops, it took all my concentration, and some lip reading with the context of the conversation to understand anyone. Then when I left the mall, and left the constant noise, it all left a ringing in my ear. The ringing was loud and constant, for a couple hours until I went to sleep for the night.

Fortunately, I was able to see a doctor Tuesday morning. Diagnosis: wax in my ear canal.

They used some drops and warm water in a syringe to clean it all out, but that didn’t work any better for them than it had for me over the weekend. So then the doctor used a long scooper tool to reach in and dig it out. This, I did not like.

The doctor said, “This is going to be very uncomfortable, and will make you cough.”

That “make you cough” statement didn’t register with me when the doc said it, but the first time she dug in my ear canal, it set me on one of the biggest coughing fits of my life. But after the first dig, I didn’t get the coughing urge — but the discomfort was incredible.

Oh my God! Holy crap! And a whole bunch of other, X-rated, exclamations!

That digging in my ear canal hurt like crazy. I was prepared for some discomfort, but the intensity was surprising. At first my natural instinct made me flinch, but the doc told me I had to be still (for obvious reasons).

The doc apologized, “I’m sorry. I know this is really painful. The wax is impacted pretty deep, and there’s a lot of stuff back in that part of the ear canal that no one is used to feeling pressure on.”

She dug in a couple more times. “You can’t hold your breath,” she warned. “Just concentrate on breathing normally. And yes, you can clinch your fists like you’re doing, to help steel against the feeling.”

After she dug in four or five times, and apologized after every time, I needed to ask her how many more times she was going in. I felt I’d do better if I just had an idea of how much longer I had to endure.

“Just one more time,” she answered. Then she did.

She told me that there was still some more wax in my canal, but it was too close to my eardrum for her to dig with her tool. “I got three-quarters of it,” she said, “and that should make that last bit easier to get with drops.”

The ordeal was over. She told me to wait a few days, to let my ear rest, and then over next weekend, use the ear drops and rinse out the last bit.

I “recovered” from the ear canal work quickly. Actually, I got over each time within a few seconds of the dig. The pain didn’t stay with me long, which kind of surprised me. I mean, something that hurts that much seems like it should have some lasting effect. By the time I was out of the doctor’s office, I couldn’t even remember exactly what the action felt like.

I can remember my reaction, and the intensity level, but I can’t really describe the kind of pain. It was really weird to feel that sensation one moment, but then have the feeling fade not just from my nerves but even from my memory so quickly. A really strange situation.

At least the procedure restored maybe half the hearing in my left ear. I’m better, but not back to normal yet. I can hardly wait for this weekend when I can try to get the last of the blockage out of my ear. I am so ready to hear normally again.

Bullgrit