multiplicity_archives | first post to HOH and plural living. intro-but-not-quite. :-D

cross-posted to

hard_of_hearing,

multiplicity,

plural_living,

synaesthesis, and

oihanen.

this covers a broad range of topics, but it is about hearing. plurality and synaesthesia play roles, though, for any who feel they can give advice. it would be much appreciated. we've been noticeably hard of hearing to ourselves since we were 12. we're 17, now, and it's only gotten worse. but depending on who's front, hearing changes. not drastically, but everyone thought we were making it up until a friend pulled us out of traffic we didn't hear behind us. some people still do, though. but who cares. screw them. the best explanation we've got for now is that the problems are "sporadic" without revealing to the physician community that we're batshit crazy. we're normally paranoid about doctors, but since communication and control is better, we're trying to get body glitches fixed while the peace lasts. i've already been to the ob/gyn without clocking her. i feel accomplished.

-beast

each of us has different levels of capability, some that aren't as disruptive as others. insiders with hearing difficulties on the outside aren't a major concern because their hearing suits their activities on the inside, like géve's fantastically clear upper-range hearing for her guard duties in the forest. she can't hear lower sounds like adult male voices when she's outside, but she's not particularly concerned.

fronters, though, are a little trickier.

my own hearing is muted, like someone has softened all the consonants and rounded the vowels. synaesthesia's no help in this case, because all i can tell is if someone's voice tastes like vanilla. i'm a devoted linguaphile, and my spanish teacher just had thyroid surgery, so that's made class really difficult, but she understands i don't pick up things the first or even tenth time i've heard them. she's been fantastic about the whole thing, as have a lot of my friends. some people can be jerks, but who needs them. probably didn't have anything to say i'd want to listen to anyways.

ladylighter and myself collaborate to play french horn together, but her problem is that all sounds are distorted. consonants flip themselves around. some sounds disappear entirely sometimes, but we haven't figured out when or why. she's synaesthetic, too, though, so she can compensate while in band because each scale (and note) has it's own visual pattern. that also means we have no idea what or where we're playing until the first note starts. outside of band, it's a lost cause for her.

beast has the best hearing of all, and she's perfectly smug about it. her consonants are only a little muted, but she gets most of the sound. i think if we get myself and ladylighter figured out, beast will come along.

we've tried squishing together the people with appropriate parts at different time, like ll's music-reading, my playing, turtle's hearing, beast's strong body, lelin's spatial awareness and balance (something none of us have) and géve's good vision, but it's too difficult to hold together and leaves everyone feeling like they've been put through a meat grinder.

-eve

and that about wraps it up. sorry if it seemed like i strayed off topic, but i've got a lot of people to cover and compensate for. hope that wasn't a horrible first post. we've got our first appointment with an audiologist in nashville on the 2nd. wish us luck? i have no idea how to proceed with explaining all of this except for the "sporadic" bit. even then, there's the chance that the dr will say it's just our imagination. until next time..

-eve