“Hearing health has to become part of our story and it has to become part of who we are as whole people.”

Meet Jennifer Green Wilson | Audiology Client | Higher Education

- Click the link above to play Jennifer’s Video Testimonial

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT (3:22 Mins.)

I didn't know that I had a hearing problem it was actually my roommate in my undergraduate degree and my fiancé who kind of got together and said hmm either she doesn't pay attention or she can't hear and so I had some very close peer pressure to go get a hearing test and found out that I actually had a congenital hearing loss that I had from birth that went undetected so I kept having hearing tests and it went from a mild hearing loss to a moderately severe hearing loss I knew that I was not able to hear and I would not be productive in the role that I was in because the conference rooms that we had the meetings that we would have lots of people long tables and I just couldn't hear and so that's when I really started to invest in hearing aids at the time I'm a physical therapist as my undergraduate degree I know all about disabilities I coach people I Mentor people I motivate people but this was really hard and unfortunately vanity was a big part of that because I think there's a stigma if you can't hear well you must not be very smart or you must not be very capable and so you know we wear eyeglasses they have become a fashion statement and yet the hearing aid situation or wearing hearing aids being able to hear it's just it's not the same initially I had the very small hearing aids so that no one could really see that I had them and the amount of listening and hearing to be able to function I was exhausted my audiologist at Rochester Hearing and Speech if I had not had her she coached me she mentored me she let me cry you know in the exam room and she basically said Jennifer you don't have the right equipment you need to get the behind the ear hearing aids being able to go to somebody that I really trusted that had my best interests in mind that had knowledge and exposure in ways again you know as a physical therapist I'm used to dealing with disabilities but this was a whole new area and being able to go to her to say this is what I'm feeling this is what I'm hearing this is what's going on she was able to coach and advise me in a way if you just buy hearing aids you're not going to be as successful you really need to have that relationship and that process the hearing impairment journey disability is expensive and it's mostly self-pay and and I think that starting to adopt things to protect hearing loss you know maybe they have a baseline hearing loss right now but they have to really understand it's a hard disability there's technology available you can cope with it deal with it but but it is something that you really have to pay attention to so hearing health has to become part of our story and it has to become part of who we are as whole people