Here at ‘Iwearhearingaids.org', I have a couple of overarching themes which I consider to be ‘The Realities of Life with hearing aids.' Those realities are 1) You need to wear your hearing aids, 2) Your physical location will help you hear better, 3) Water is not your friend and 4) It is not enough to just wear your hearing aids. I have chosen these four realities because most situations experienced by hearing aid users fall generally into one or two of these categories.
There are many times in life where advocating for and asserting yourself is the most important thing you can do. For example, asking for a raise when you know you deserve one or asking to have your burger re-cooked if it was under/over-cooked. You get the idea. Other times, it’s necessary to have other people help you advocate for yourself, for example getting a lawyer when your landlord isn’t living up to half of the contract. Regardless of the situation, you need to know when it’s time to advocate for yourself. When it comes to being able to hear, I can’t think of a single reason why you should compromise. The good news is, I’ve only been in a very small number of situations where I had any trouble getting the help I needed. In each of those cases, I was able to come to some arrangement that was satisfactory. In short, I advocated for myself successfully.
What is Advocacy?
In a nutshell, I think of advocacy as two-fold. First, putting myself in the best position to hear. Second, simply letting people know that I am hearing impaired and why I need certain accommodations.
For example, background noise makes it difficult to hear in a restaurant, so I position myself so that my back is against a wall to minimize the background noise. Most of the time, I’m able to subtly take the seat with my back to a wall and my dinner companions don’t even know what I’m up to. However, sometimes they beat me to the best spot, so I explain the situation to them and they immediately let me have that seat.
Being Assertive
Advocating for yourself requires that you be assertive. Most of the time you’re not going to need to do anything but explain to someone the situation and how you need to be accommodated. If there’s resistance, ask them if they have any ideas to help you that would be a good compromise. However, if the compromise isn’t satisfactory, or turns out to be inadequate, you should continue to assert your needs until you are satisfied. Focus on why you need something to be done the way it is, usually, that is enough.
Being assertive also requires that you are calm and persistent. If you begin to yell or attack the people with whom you’re trying to work, chances are they’ll be less inclined to help. I am very fortunate in that I have never had a situation where it escalated in a negative way. Only once, while I was trying to work with a particularly arrogant professor, have I had any trouble, which I resolved using the ‘Americans with Disabilities Act.’
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
Part of advocacy and being assertive is knowing the law. The ADA protects you from discrimination and requires reasonable accommodations be made for people with disabilities. Simply knowing that helps should you ever get into a situation with an employer or a school where people are not being accommodating. On the job, bring up the ADA to your manager, talk to someone in Human Resources about your needs. Also, check out the services available to you through the government (www.ada.gov) if you feel the need to. Try searching the ADA website for ‘reasonable accommodations for hearing loss’ if you’re looking for a place to start.
Please realize that ‘reasonable accommodation’ doesn’t mean ‘whatever you want.’ So, you may have to compromise.
Conclusion
Having a hearing loss requires vigilance, advocacy, and assertiveness on your part to be able to function well. Usually explaining to people why you need something to be done, is enough. With practice, you’ll find that most of the time you’ll advocate for yourself silently through where you position yourself and with whom you choose to spend your time. The people I spend most of my time with at work and at home understand my needs and are genuinely interested in making sure I’m accommodated. I am truly grateful to them.
Until next time, please keep in mind that if you need hearing aids and don't wear them, you should! If you know someone who needs them and doesn't, do them a favor and talk to them. If you need to, send them to this site. It's ok to wear hearing aids, there are lots of us who do!
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