This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2011, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Hearing loss doesn't lead to death, like cancer does, so it gets much less media attention. What people don't realize is that hearing loss is a living death, isolating us from friends, family and social life.
Hearing aids help, but there's a reason they are not called hearing miracles. It's always a struggle to hear. All day long it's a puzzle of sounds; it's exhausting to continually piece them together to make whole words and then sentences. Large family gatherings and social events create a cacophony of noise that leaves us excluded.
I have struggled with hearing loss for 20 years. I moved to Salt Lake City two years ago, and one of the first things I did was search out a hearing loss group. I found two: the Sanderson Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing (http://deafservices.utah.gov) and the Salt Lake chapter of the Hearing Loss Association of America (http://www.hlaslc.org), which meets monthly. Each has programs and workshops for the hard of hearing.
If you are alone with hearing loss, contact one. It made a difference for me.
Chelle George
Salt Lake City