Monday 30 January 2012

Monday 30 Jan

Today I am booked in for an MRI scan and some blood tests. I've no idea what the blood tests are for but I just hope they don't show up anything nasty. I've never been in an MRI scanner before and was unprepared for the amount of noise they make. Jesus! I was made to remove all my metal face furniture because of the powerful magnets involved and was told to lie down on the bench in preparation before being squeezed into the white tube. There's not a lot of space in there and that 20 minute scan felt like a very long twenty minutes. Angie waited outside. She has been absolutely brilliant throughout all this. I have always, wrongly imagined that she would get quite impatient around me if I was ill or incapacitated in some way. Maybe I just had the wrong things wrong with me in the past. Isn't man-flu a serious illness? Anyway, she has been a total rock. In fact, at times it feels like she's being over protective and pampering to the point where I want to say stop worrying about me, I'm fine. The great thing is that she gets how important my hearing is to me and actually so do I now. In the words of Joni "we don't know what we've got til it's gone" Scanned and 6 test tubes of blood lighter I set off for Box near Bath to meet up with the band and Mike for the first time since my hearing loss. They are all very nice and listen to my story before we start work by going to have lunch. It's the Marillion way.... Part of my research the previous week was into earplugs. You name em, I've now got a few pairs of them. And the winners are.... Hearos... by a country mile. I knew they were going to be essential in blocking the out of tune mess that my left ear currently calls hearing. The afternoon was ok, we worked on some arrangements quietly, which I could cope fine with. Later, after dinner we jammed, sometimes loudly which was more of a challenge. My tinnitus gets louder in response to loud music even with an earplug in my left ear. It's obviously a brain thing.

4 comments:

  1. Hi Mark, Sorry to hear about your situation but am reading your blog with interest. My wife has had Sensorineural Hearing Loss since childhood in both ears but she later played keyboards in a band with me and we rigged up her own controlable foldback (which you obviously already have). One idea that came to me that might work better than earplugs when playing would be for you to have top of the range (Bose?) noise cancelling headphones with everything panned towards your good ear, but might also cut out most of the sound coming externally from the band into your bad ear. Hope this suggestion helps and that your condition improves. Paul Moore

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    1. Hi Paul, it's been a real education to me to find out how many of us there are out there with SSHL. I feel very encouraged that a lot can be archived even with one ear down or damaged. The noise cancelling headphones sounds worth investigating. We aren't planning any gig for a while so its early days.

      All the best to you both

      Mark

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  2. I lost a lot of my hearing suddenly in my left ear just over a year ago. I was bending over and felt a popping sound and the hearing was gone. The doctor said that they do not know what causes it (other than some of the things you mentioned in an earlier post) or what cures it but said steroids often help. I agreed to the steroid treatment which involved large doses every day for a week (but getting less towards the end). The hearing was back to almost normal after a week and has been fine since so I hope you get better.

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    1. Hi Jd, I'm on steroids too. Not sure what good they are doing but it's worth a try. My hearing isn't normal but it's improving. A week ago I was stone deaf in one ear.

      Best

      Mark

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