Dime
Well-known member
Best of luck on your surgery, I hope it makes you feel young again.
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TOTALLY RANDOM POST II
- Thread starter minds_I
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your perception is spot-on IMHO. my hearing has been shit for years, mainly due to gunfire, short-barreled revolvers & large-gauge shotguns. wife finally talked me into buying hearing aids, $2500 worth. total fucking waste of money UNLESS i am out in the woods. wife still turns her back/walks away while talking, which results in my hearing noise like the adults talking in Peanuts cartoons, blahblahblahblah. they muddle music so bad that i take them off to listen. turning the volume up results in my being able to understand the lyrics instead of it just being a jumble of blended noise. all of that money, wasted...
they are testing (or were last year) a method that -might- regrow the tiny hairs in your ear canal that actually transmit the sound. i'd volunteer for it if i knew where to apply... something about umbilical cord material transplant ?
moose eater
Well-known member
There are national directories for clinical trials. I've looked at some of those for my type of cancer.they are testing (or were last year) a method that -might- regrow the tiny hairs in your ear canal that actually transmit the sound. i'd volunteer for it if i knew where to apply... something about umbilical cord material transplant ?
There might or might not be similar listings for other medical procedures like you're referring to.
Google can sometimes be your friend. I abstained from saying Google IS your friend, due to their data retention policies.
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This is one of my big concerns. I was a music (listening) professional and it is very important to me. There are several types of ha's and each one affects music - external not Bluetooth - differently. As well, there are settings that speech needs that make music sound like shit in an ha so it is crucial to have a few different scenarios available. And - of course - the tech has been changing rapidly over the last decade so anything older just won't have the same abilities - and this will never change.
moose eater
Well-known member
About 20 years ago I found that if I was standing or sitting in the woods very quietly, there were times that a twig would snap, or branch break, and I couldn't always tell what direction it was coming from. A loss of ability to discern direction or source where noises in the woods were concerned.
And I have had 'bearanoia' for many years, so when there's more activity with the bears due to moose gut piles lying about, and/or people moving through, causing some bears to move as well, not being able to tell where a sound came from, or when the moose are rubbing trees, and not being able to always tell from which direction the noise is coming from, it's bothered me.
More often than not, if the moose were rutting and sparring, and it was a hard knocking sound, like pool balls breaking, antlers hitting antlers, I could still frequently tell more or less where THOSE sounds came from, but there were other frequencies or tones that I couldn't tell jack shit about, other than 'there was a sound some place.' And it bothered me a -lot- at times.
moose eater
Well-known member
Functional enough to do the things I enjoy doing would be fine by me. Like maybe the 45-year-old me, in terms of physical ability without the week to 3 weeks (or more) of quasi-crippling that now follows such ventures..
Last one gave me 6+ years.
Thanks for your kindness.
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Directionality is something you pay for in an ha. It requires carefully engineered microphones that then use sophisticated algorithms to calculate proximity in multiple directions simultaneously so your brain can make an educated guess. This $8K pair has very good directionality. I was really monitoring this when I went for my usual morning dog walk. But then it is a RIC (or it is a RIE or a RITE?) which has a ventilated receiver in ear (a misnomer since it is a transducer and a receiver but that is not pertinent here) so I still hear the great outdoors directly. It doesn't have a bear avoidance mode in the app.
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moose eater
Well-known member
No bear avoidance app!!Directionality is something you pay for in an ha. It requires carefully engineered microphones that then use sophisticated algorithms to calculate proximity in multiple directions simultaneously so your brain can make an educated guess. This $8K pair has very good directionality. I was really monitoring this when I went for my usual morning dog walk. But then it is a RIC (or it is a RIE or a RITE?) which has a ventilated receiver in ear (a misnomer since it is a transducer and a receiver but that is not pertinent here) so I still hear the great outdoors directly. It doesn't have a bear avoidance mode in the app.
My wife has repeatedly 'encouraged' ('demanded' maybe?) me to end her frustration resulting from the television being what she believes to be at abnormally loud volumes, having to scream through the passive vents in the house for me to hear her when she's upstairs and I'm on the main floor (let alone if I'm in the basement), loud music on the stereo, etc..
I've told her my biggest opposition to the idea of buying decent hearing aids is the outrageous pricing for something functional.
I'm guessing, depending on place of manufacture, that I might be able to get something similar to what you've described for perhaps $5,000 to $6,500 USD, just considering the exchange rates and possible effect of tariffs.
In my frugality, that's a LOT of money.. even today.
Costco has some custom ras that are highly rated for $1500 USD. They do the listening test and fitting for free & they have a 6 month return policy on them etc etc. I have resisted Costco for over 15 years but this is going to make me go to try them out.
moose eater
Well-known member
My wife will be pleased to hear that.Costco has some custom ras that are highly rated for $1500 USD. They do the listening test and fitting for free & they have a 6 month return policy on them etc etc. I have resisted Costco for over 15 years but this is going to make me go to try them out.
Whatever her reply, I may still yell, "WHAT??!!" just for effect.
i've only had my set for a couple of months. when one quit on me the other day (bad receiver, replaced at their shop in less than 2 minutes) the lady offered to let me try an app they had just released just for music. but, since i don't have a phone, smart or otherwise, that wasn't an option.
i can't hear tom turkeys gobbling unless they are damn near in gun range, under 50 yards. bad frequency i guess...
yer mean, moose, just plumb mean...
Tell her to set it up as a program that you can access with the buttons if it is possible - which it probably is. You usually have a volume up, volume down and program select with different buttons or combinations of them.
It is a full moon tonight and this is the peak of the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival. My daughter-in-law has asked us out to dinner, so I guess we are eating Chinese tonight . . . and this will give me a chance to try out these crazy price hearing aids in a noisy restaurant. My wife has offered to drive, so I can be uproariously high.
moose eater
Well-known member
Murphy lives!!
Having raced to get my blood draw done before my first decent dental appointment in years, on the way to the dentist, the lab that drew my blood rang my cell phone to tell me they'd mislabeled the vials, and I'd need to return to the lab for a second go at it.
Then, lying back in the dentist's chair, having finished the preliminary series of umpteen x-rays, the rubberized rotary brushing with the pumice paste, etc., and the dentist now doing the deeper cleaning with a mechanized scaling machine, my cell phone rang again, and I didn't answer it due to the ongoing work with the dentist.
Once I got back outside to the vehicle, I checked my voice mail on my cell phone, and the neurosurgeon's office was informing me they'd had a cancellation opening in Anchorage for my surgery and wanted to know if I could be there Tuesday!!
Say what?!! A week to get this place in shape, make arrangements for needs and reservations down that way, and more, and they want to know if I can be there for surgery Tuesday, which really means arriving on Sunday to do the pre-op stuff on Monday, more likely than not.
I've got a puppy getting spayed next Wednesday, 4 vehicles to put snow tires on, heating fuel oil to haul and transfer, and on top of all of that, I discovered some alarming reviews for my surgeon-to-be last night, which didn't help with sleeping much.
I think I'm going to try and stick more closely to the original schedule, though that potentially puts us closer to snow landing on our way home.
Having raced to get my blood draw done before my first decent dental appointment in years, on the way to the dentist, the lab that drew my blood rang my cell phone to tell me they'd mislabeled the vials, and I'd need to return to the lab for a second go at it.
Then, lying back in the dentist's chair, having finished the preliminary series of umpteen x-rays, the rubberized rotary brushing with the pumice paste, etc., and the dentist now doing the deeper cleaning with a mechanized scaling machine, my cell phone rang again, and I didn't answer it due to the ongoing work with the dentist.
Once I got back outside to the vehicle, I checked my voice mail on my cell phone, and the neurosurgeon's office was informing me they'd had a cancellation opening in Anchorage for my surgery and wanted to know if I could be there Tuesday!!
Say what?!! A week to get this place in shape, make arrangements for needs and reservations down that way, and more, and they want to know if I can be there for surgery Tuesday, which really means arriving on Sunday to do the pre-op stuff on Monday, more likely than not.
I've got a puppy getting spayed next Wednesday, 4 vehicles to put snow tires on, heating fuel oil to haul and transfer, and on top of all of that, I discovered some alarming reviews for my surgeon-to-be last night, which didn't help with sleeping much.
I think I'm going to try and stick more closely to the original schedule, though that potentially puts us closer to snow landing on our way home.
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CharlesU Farley
Well-known member
When I had my last back op (the dremeling two years after my laminectomy) when I checked at ungodly hour the surgeon came up and said that it had to be a day operation and I could not stay the night because the hospital was shutting down for the initial Covid outbreak. If that was OK with us, he could proceed . . . or I could wait until the next available slot at some future time. We went for it - of course - but the hospital was slammed. I woke up in recovery and my wife appeared within minutes to wheel me out to the car with one spare bandage and a script for Oxys. They actually let her into recovery in street clothes . . . anyways, I was a mess for a day or two but she nursed me and all was well.
moose eater
Well-known member
So you had a laminotomy after your initial laminectomy? Or just a trimming of bone spurs near or at the lamina that resulted from the first go-round?
My reading tells me that there's a greater failure rate in second spine surgeries, even if only in the same -general- area, not necessarily -the same exact- location, as long as it's close enough to previous scar tissue to require peeling the original scar tissue back, thus increasing the odds of tearing the dura or fucking up the nerves there, simply due to the initial scar tissue from the first go, growing into/onto to the dura or the nerves in that area.
Was your second go at it a laminotomy? How did you fare?
Some rather abysmal stats put the second surgery at a ~30% success rates. I'd buy a lottery ticket with those odds, but my primary wiring harness in my spine needs/wants something closer to Powerball odds re. failures. Like, you know, maybe 1:1,000,000.
If you're willing, please tell me what you know and what your experience was with your expectations.
Acknowledging that each patient and surgeon, even day, is potentially a different outcome.
I don't have a weakness for opiates, and made my way past the first several different surgeries (knee, spine, prostatectomy, etc.) with minimal issue with them, despite having lots of oxycodone on hand, minus any carrier like acetaminophen (*still have a fair amount of the nasty little ineffective buggers lying about), other than for constipation and not liking being 'downed out' perpetually very much at all (*I noted they offered me no pharmaceutical coke or hallucinogens; cheap bastards!!), but survived the biggest pain in the ass, constipation, by taking a variety of pills, including some 'organics', to combat that miserable feature of the things.
(*The draw to opiates has ALWAYS befuddled me, by the way... Walking uphill through fucking beach sand is no recreational buzz, in my opinion; make life faster or prettier, by all means, but doubling the required effort toward movement is a non-starter for my list of recreational pharmacological pursuits).
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