Since my total left sided hearing loss in April, I completed 5 sets of intratympanic decadron injections, and was tapered off Prednisone after one month of treatment. I have a regained some hearing, which the audiologists still call "no useable hearing," since I can not discriminate language on the affected side. The only noticeable change in hearing on that side is that I can hear a distorted dial tone when I pick up the phone, whereas before I heard nothing when I picked up the phone.
I still have no directionality with sound, I can not tell where anyone is in my house by voice alone, and the "find my iphone" app by playing a sound does not work for me anymore.
The harder part is the tinnitus. It is not roaring jet sound like it was at the beginning of this event 2 months ago, but it is constant, sounds of wind, whistling, Pink Floyd instrumentals. There are all kinds of tinnitus apps I got on my ipad and iphone that play nature sounds to mask the tinnitus. This may seem negative, but all those did for me was make me dislike hearing the ocean. And for a girl from Miami, that is an adverse outcome. The tinnitus makes me tired.
If I am to be deaf on the left, why can't I at least have some quiet?
And I still have the sequealae of my original surgery in 2010, the metallic tongue taste, and numbness of the left side of my scalp. These are meaningless, just irritants.
Sometimes I feel down about all of this. I thought I was out of the woods, how could I lose my hearing over 4 years later? My husband tells me that maybe the gift I got was hearing for 4 more years, and that's it. And the 4 extra years of hearing was important for my youngest, who is now 10, that is was invaluable to him to have a perfectly hearing mother for 10 years.
We joke about it, and sometimes I cry about it.
