After seven years of my Little Blue Boxes, change was definitely in order. Yes those boxes served me well over their life, and I managed to make them last longer than they might otherwise hav. But what I failed to realize, as I almost always do when used to my hearing situation, is how much I had lost.

All of the paperwork cleared up and aids purchased, I finally, somewhat excitedly, scheduled the appointment to acquire my new aids on Monday. It’s weirdly like a kid on Christmas, having been accompanied by the knowledge that this change might make it easier to function in work, social, and other similar areas.

These aids are still Phonak, what sounded when the audiologist read them like a string of letters and numbers that, she says, means they’re “really good”. We get them in, with my new molds that seem to fit fine, with no issue. They feel as my loaner aid had: skinnier and with a single volume control on the back of each. Like my previous Phonak though, and I would guess most modern aids, they work together to ensure that I have the best hearing profile in any place I night find myself. They also use the same batteries, sized 675, that seem to power my loaner for nearly a month apiece. As she points out though, these aren’t likely to last that long due to their sharing power and the like. I am ok with that, but curious how long they will indeed last.

When turned on, the first thing I said was “the sound is just cleaner”. By this, I think I meant that there was less vocal distortion? I’m not exactly up on all the correct audio terms, but it just seems more natural to me somehow. The other aids had a lot of bass, but they tended to blend everything together far more than what I am currently experiencing. I was happy to have T-Coil back on both, and the ability to listen to the phone and headphones played through both aids, even if held only to one ear.

And then for the fun part, a venture into the larger world. I was kind of bummed that my Uber driver really did not say much, as I wanted to see if theyb would be more effective when cruising on the Interstate. But in going to work today, I found that I could much more easily har conversations on the bus, and even being in this typically loud workshop was not too bad. Finally, watching TV at home and holding another conversation now presents fewer difficulties. I know that the real fun will occur when I go to a restaurant, wherein I can in theory put the aids into Background mode and hopefully be able to hear a lot more. I am anxious to see how that goes.

And that’s about all I have on that front. Everything’s still being evaluated at this point, but I am thus far quite pleased with what I am getting. No aid will ever completely approximate natural sound, but this one is so close that it reminds me of what I have ben missing for so many years.