When her hearing aid packed up, Mary Kenny was suddenly confined to an isolated, miserable world
I have seldom felt loneliness but, for nearly three months this year, I’ve certainly experienced social isolation. Yes, my main hearing aid stopped working. Specsavers took nearly 12 weeks to repair it. For most of that time, they ignored my pleas for rescue from this world of being half deaf. I have hearing aids in both ears, but the left side seems more significant, and its loss greater. It’s astonishing how deafness isolates. You go to birthday parties, poetry readings and even political talks, where you only catch half of what’s being said. Instead of constantly asking for repeats, you smile vaguely and say, ‘Very interesting,’ in response to every semi-heard conversation. You feign laughter at jokes whose pay-off line you haven’t caught. You develop a mild social phobia about attending gatherings: easier to stay at home and just turn up the volume on radio and TV. As David Lodge...
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