Deborah

I started to lose my hearing quite quickly 35 years ago due to Menieres Disease. As I lost more I knew I needed more skills. I have joined a lipreading class and learnt to finger spell. For most of the time I benefitted from being with people who understood and shared my difficulties. However, the only family member willing to learn finger spelling was my youngest grandson. It proved very useful when he was playing out and I was upstairs. He could spell what he wanted without me having to go down stairs. It was also useful for secrets. During lockdown my husband finally joined the class. He began to understand that I wasn’t just being a nag by asking him to move away from the window, to take his hand from his mouth, to get my attention first, the basics that he thought were just nagging. Life is so much better. unfortunately my disabilities are now affecting my hands and I struggle to form some letters but my group are used to that but. I feel I want to be quicker to begin each letter so I have more time to spend on forming the letters. I tried the finger spelling game today but the keypad keeps blocking the view so I miss those hand movements. Tomorrow I will use my computer instead of my iPad to easily avoid that issue. My local hospital has a finger speller in most departments which is wonderful. They are working on increasing the staff who can sign. That is also this year’s resolution for me. I look forward to learning more.