Music has always been one of my favorite things in life. I was born with a mild hearing loss in the better ear, which dropped to a severe-to-profound hearing loss over the course of several weeks before I entered junior high school. I still continued to play in the band, but never sang again, except, much later, to appreciate signed music.
When I began dating my husband, Tim Maier, he felt a deep sense of guilt when playing his guitar around me. It took a great deal of discussion and watching movies such as
Children of a Lesser God
to explain that I heard music in my "own way," though not necessarily "the right way." The ability to enjoy music, I felt, did not depend on hearing well. Even though my hearing was far less than his, the emotional enjoyment we experienced was equivalent.
After years of thinking about getting a cochlear implant, I finally had surgery on Dec. 11, 2002. I chose to implant the worse ear, in which I had not heard anything for the past 28 years. Six weeks later, the implant was activated on Jan. 22, and after we left the hospital my husband put on some music in the car. One music enthusiast on an e-mail discussion group said that she enjoyed music with a lot of percussion when she was first activated, and I found this to be true. With the implant, I could pick out the percussion, and music had different metallic pitches. With some imagination, and likely in combination with my low-frequency residual hearing, I almost could distinguish an elusive melody. It was easier to listen to than speech.
I was determined to enjoy music with the implant. I started with simple tasks, trying to distinguish the music from the car noise, to determine when the songs stopped and started, and to follow the beat. I selected music based on what I could hear at the time, and stayed away from melodic music in favor of rock and roll with a driving beat. I didn’t seem to have much pitch differentiation, so parts of the song seemed to be electrically smeared. It was akin to reading printed text that was blurry and smudged in certain spots. Gradually, things came into focus, and several weeks later I was able to enjoy most of my music collection.
But listening to music with the implant was not without disappointment. I seemed to do better with music that was not as familiar and for which I didn’t have a preconceived idea of what it should sound like, so that I could come to enjoy it in a new way. Some songs that I previously liked now sounded terrible, and some singers had a raspy voice. Sudden changes in loudness left the louder sections of songs sounding squished, and I am still not able to understand much more of the lyrics to popular music.
One of my favorite songs features a female vocalist with a low-pitched voice, and although I recognized the words, having long since memorized them, it didn’t even sound like a woman singing. I put the CD away, taking it out every several weeks in hopes that time and experience with the implant would help. And slowly, it sounded better.
Susan Boswell
is an associate editor/writer for
The ASHA Leader
. She wishes to thank the many professionals who made her implant possible through the surgery, programming, information, and support. Contact her by e-mail at
sboswell@asha.org
.