Whenever someone starts suffering from hearing loss problems, they might go for many options for a remedy such as hearing aids. Especially for permanent hearing loss problems, using digital hearing aids is one of the best and most effective options. Also, they are affordable too. But it might happen to you that you are not getting comfortable with your hearing aids. But this is totally normal, and they will need some getting used to. As hearing aids are unfamiliar to the ears, they will feel uncomfortable even though they are improving your hearing ability.
You should learn how you can get used to with your hearing aid, as if you don’t do so, you won’t be able to use them in the long run, and won’t get the benefits you were supposed to get. As per estimation, one out of eight people that buy hearing aids leaves them unused due to not being used to them. And the sounds can be overwhelming too at first, so you’ll also need your brain to adjust with the improves the sound system. Here are a few ways how you can get used to using your hearing aids-
Letting them adjust comfortably with your ears
Your ears will need some time adjusting to the feeling of your hearing aids, as they are a totally new addition to your ears. If you have used glasses, you will know that they needed some adjusting too to sit on your nose. Even if you feel uneasy about the presence of a new accessory, in the beginning, it will go away within a few days. You’ll just have to use it for a few days with patience.
Wearing the aids for only a few hours per day at first
You don’t have to keep your hearing aids on all the time if you feel comfortable. You can just use them in the situations and environments you feel comfortable with for the first few days. It is recommended by professionals to use them during your waking hours.
The more you’ll use them the more you will get used to your aids, and the more unnecessary sound you will be able to detect and filter out, which is good for your ear’s health. Practicing to use them even in quiet situations will help your brain to adjust faster in a noisy environment.
Taking time to adjust your sound processing
If you took quite some time in starting to use a hearing aid, you will hear sounds that you haven’t heard in a long period. So, it will take time to get used to those sounds again. Also, it will be a completely new experience as sounds will be directly amplified into your ear. And you will get completely used to that with time. You can also follow the adjustment procedure recommended by your audiologist.
Not messing with the volume much
Hearing aids are supposed to adjust to various listening situations easily and automatically, so you won’t need to manually adjust them too often. Don’t turn the volume too high, as you shouldn’t try to listen to every subtle noise.
Practicing talking to groups of people
You should have frequent conversations with your family members and close friends after getting hearing aids, as you can identify their voices easily. You might face problems while talking to a group instead of a single person, so you can try and practice with them to get more used to talking with multiple people at a time. You should try to listen actively and it will help your brain to create connections between sounds, nonverbal body language, vocal patterns, etc.
Setting the television to a normal volume
When you will watch TV with your friends and family, ask them to set the volume to a normal range, not too loud or high.
Watching Movies or Shows with Subtitles
While watching something you should turn the subtitles or caption on, as listening to and reading words at the same time can help your brain connect to both language and sounds. You can listen to the audiobook version of a book in the same way while reading a printed version of it.
Gradually increasing the time of your wearing the aids
You should start wearing the aids for more and more time gradually until you are able to keep them on for all the hours you are awake. This consistency will help your brain adjust to the sound amplification and will ensure that your hearing aids help you hear as much as possible.
Final Words
It is really important that you get really comfortable with using your hearing aids so that you can get full satisfaction from the aids, and also get the results as per your expectation. Using of hearing aid will help you with your hearing health and ability, so it is important to make sure that you get adjusted with your hearing aids properly.