Frustrated by mother's hearing loss

[frust]

Can anyone relate to this?

My mum's hearing is so bad and she won't do anything about it. She's early 60s.

She basically cannot understand unless she lip reads. There have been situations where I really needed to get her attention in a dangerous situation and she just doesn't hear. I have told her to get help so many times, but she just does not.

Can anyone relate ? I know we can't make anyone do something they don't want to do, but it's affecting our relationship a lot. I don't even bother saying stuff to her in certain situations because I know she won't understand. Other people have noticed and you can't really carry a normal conversation with her. I have to repeat things a lot and shout them out, it's tiring.

Is it normal for her hearing to be this bad ? I am quite worried about her. She just won't get checked out.

This could be me writing your post!

Mum is in her 70s and she can never hear us when we're talking but won't do anything about it. It makes me not want to phone her because all she says is 'what'! She gets frustrated and says we need to shout when we talk.

We begged her at Christmas to look in to it and she still hasn't.

Why is the wrong only on one side here? Where is the mother's empathy and thoughtfulness? Do you have any idea how frustrating it is trying to communicate with someone like this?

You're not alone, OP. My father absolutely refuses to accept his hearing loss. He has the TV volume up at warp speed, pissing off the neighbours and making it impossible for anyone else to have a conversation, but no, nothing wrong with him. Apparently we must all have something faulty with our ears that makes us hear the TV too loud 🙄. No, he's not joking.

Normal conversation with him is impossible but he loses his temper with everyone for apparently being rude by not including him in conversations. He's an aggressive man so this is all very unpleasant.

I just don't know how long this can go on before he finally gets it.

yes that is very normal. She might hear some sounds better than others - so difficulty with different pitch voices. If she lip reads, some people move their lips well, others don't or move their face away when you're talking so she can't see, or have facial hair so you can't see lip movements well. Accents as well make it difficult to hear or lip read some rather than others. And some people just talk louder than others. Is there background noise? Do those people have good use facial expressions or body language. She may support herself in so ways, so many variables. And it's not just about hearing or not hearing, it's about understanding

My Grandma has a hearing aid from Specsavers that we paid £3,000 for.
it’s much smaller and not noticeable compared to the larger nhs ones that she was embarrassed about needing.

Can I ask if your aids from Boots are in-ear ones? I'm late 50s and have had 2 aids for the past 15 years or so. I have a more uncommon loss apparently, reverse-slope . I've too tried and given up for a number of years, but now and for the past 4-5 years I've found them more comfortable. I still HATE the fact they are behind my ears and fall out when caught in my hair, wearing sunglasses etc, and have asked my NHS audiologist about in-ear private ones. They suggested that they are less effective and drown out natural sound? I'd love to try them but worried about committing the ££s. Any advice?
(sorry for hijacking!!)

I also developed a hearing issue at your mum's age..I can hear a pin drop but clarity in conversation eludes me. I could see it was frustrating my kids and in certain situations it was mortifying as accents were a huge problem too.. I eventually went to the hospital and now have hearing aids not the tiny ones either...you just can't see them they're great...I guess it's like an alcoholic you have to admit to yourself there's a problem...hopefully she'll have a light bulb moment soon for everyone's sake.

My elderly MIL is the same. Has had hearing aids for about 5 years, at vast expense, refuses to use them as ‘they are for old people’ (she is 89!). She constantly misunderstands conversations, nods that she has understood but then clearly has not.
It has become a medical issue as she neither hears nor understands what her GP tells her and then cannot follow his directions . Dealing with her is , as others have said, exhausting and deeply frustrating. Many , many times she offends people by her aggressive responses to misunderstood conversations.
I am just glad she is not my direct responsibility .Hang in there OP. 💐

I’m 61 and have cookie bite hearing loss so really affects me re conversations and TV etc. I have tiny bte digital hearing aids, blue tooth enabled. They are the bees knees, they have changed my life.

I'm 64 and had slight heaŕing loss from childhood measles. It became worse a few years ago but most noticeably I struggled to hear my son. I reluctantly had a hearing test which revealed moderate hearing loss at low frequencies. I can hear female voices just fine.
I now have NHS hearing aids which are remarkably unobtrusive. If anyone has noticed they haven't said anything. I may get private ones later as you can get Bluetooth but actually mine are fine.
Loss of hearing can contribute to dementia so important not to ignore.

My mother hated having to wear hearing aids but she did do so. However, quite often she had them in and still couldn't hear (if your mum gets them this could be useful) - we had to check if she had actually turned the volume up as she turned it right down when taking them off for the night and then, if that didn't work, whether she needed a new battery. She was always quite surprised to find how well she could hear with a fresh battery in the aid.

I can totally relate. It happened with my father first, and the one who complained the most and was the most affected was my mother. As PP have described, you had to shout at him and he would only hear on the fifth try. Shouting makes me feel angry in a kind of reverse body-mind feedback kind of sense. "I'm shouting so I must be angry". It's also that it was exhausting and frustrating, knowing that each time you wanted to say something to him it would involve many escalating efforts. So we stopped talking to him - and we couldn't even have our own conversations on the side, when with him, as he would always have the TV on highest volume.

Now he is gone and the same is happening to my mother. But, as frustrated as she was by my father, she won't get hearing aids. Simply says she's not ready. I find my visits are fraught, and she tells me not to shout at her. So I fear it might all go in the same direction as my father.

Very sad but no suggestions, I'm afraid. If they won't, they won't. And if there's one thing that drives my mother mad is the feeling that she's losing her autonomy. Which is why she's resisting our suggestions to get her hearing assessed.

I hardly think OP is unempathetic.

Perhaps if you persevered in finding the right kind of hearing aid it would make a significant difference to you and to your family?

My DH is 60. I've been telling him his hearing is bad for at least 5 years. He was in total denial. He completely mis- hears most of what is said to him which makes for some interesting conversations. He tried to blame me saying that I mumble - I don't and in fact adult DS says I talk too loudly (well not surprising as I've been trying to talk to your Father for years!)

At the end of last year I finally persuaded him to book a hearing test with a private audiologist who was recommended by a couple of friends. DH went along and was told he has a hearing loss. He was then given some hearing aids to try and was sent out to go and have a coffee in a local cafe to see what he thought about his hearing with them in. DH was amazed that he could hear the conversation of 3 men on an adjoining table!
There was no hard sell - Audiologist said it was up to DH if he wanted to go ahead and buy some aids. 8 months later though DH has done nothing about it. Expensive as they are he can afford to buy them but just hasn't bothered. So frustrating.
Not much you can do OP unless your DM will take the first step!

My mam has had eyesight (serious issues with them) she also has very little hearing.
Like yours you have to shout and I still think most of the timeshe hasn't heard but will nod etc.
She went for a hearing test through NHS but at Specsavers. They showed that she had significant hearing loss -greater than what they would expect due to age. My mam blamed it on a fall when she hit her head off the sink.
She got custom made hearing aids, but now doesn't wear them as she says they're painful and her arthritis stops her pitting them in properly. She won't go back to see why she has that extra loss, it could something easy to fix so we are back at square 1. All that time wasted!

My fil has the wire hearing aids but was still struggling. Had ears syringed twice at the hearing clinic. No change. Went to ENT and they used 'a hoover' which brought out loads of wax the staff couldn't see. He is now at a point where he is thinking of stopping using his aids as his hearing is so much better!

Just shows the difference between 2 people! My DM is totally isolated can't leave the house without one of us and often refuses to and my fil is living a great active life! 2yrs age difference between them!

*bad

Read the post.
Op's problem is that her Mother is refusing to get help.

My MIL was quite deaf. I had to repeat what I was saying several times.

Except I wasn't actually repeating it word for word, but had a tendency to paraphrase or use a different, but similar in meaning word.

Things improved once I started paying attention to what I said, making sure to repeat exactly what I had just said. My MIL still had a memory trace of my original utterance, obviously not a perfect one, so a repetition added to and clarified that IYSWIM

This reluctance is SO common. My Step mum and my MIL were both the same. Do you have children? WE told both (at seperate times) that if they didnt' get it sorted they couldn't look after the kids as we couldn't trust them to hear if they needed help.
My stepmum got hers sorted and regrets she didnt' do it sooner. My MIL has started the process but is dragging her feet.
It's so annoying and frustrating to be around, and it's not unkind at all to ask them to address it.

Entirely. Some people are very easy to lipread, others impossible. The pitch of the voice makes a big difference too.

Sorry that was in response to your question about understanding different people OP.

I started with hearing loss in my early 30s (now 58)
Worn glasses since I was 7
Hearing aids and glasses are not at all comparable
I’ve been assessed for private aids by boots and specsavers etc but can’t afford the £5k plus for those that I need
I have NHS ones which are blue tooth etc and managed to get specialised linkable audio systems through access to work
However I still hate wearing them and only use them in certain situations
They are itchy, sweaty, uncomfortable, get tangled up with my hair and glasses, always need to change batteries, clean tubes, reconnect to different devices etc
I actually use my apple air buds more for phone, watching tv etc, zoom meetings at work

I'm sure its deeply frustrating, OP, and I feel for you both.

I have bilateral hearing loss that came on in my 30s and I entirely depend on hearing aids, lip reading and a Roger pen. It took my partner to point out how bad my hearing was and I went and hot tested at his behest.

Whilst I work hard to follow conversations with all my kit, it's mentally very draining and, yes, isolating when in a group. For me, tinnitus, tiredness and environmental factors play into how much I will hear, your mother may find the same.

However, whether I'm having a good hearing day or a bad one, hearing aids can only amplify the hearing I have left - they are not the same as glasses. Your hearing cannot be corrected using hearing aids. Even is she gets hearing aids, you will still need to accommodate her hearing loss. It's crap, I know.

On another note, I do think taking hearing aids out at the end of the day is bliss. A bit like taking your bra off. And I turn them down when I'm getting irritated by others, a real life mute button 😂

This👆 We are firmly convinced Mil’s dementia began with hearing loss.

Read David Lodge’s Deaf Sentence. It helped me understand FIL’s difficulties better…

You sound lovely. Try being more inclusive and slow down, look at her etc when speaking in the office,