As a second grader, Joy Keatley and her parents didn’t know she had a severe hearing loss in her left ear until she took the school hearing screening. With no diagnosis as to the cause or her age when the hearing loss may have occurred, Joy simply learned to live with it.

“At the time, hearing aids that could benefit my particular condition had yet to be invented,” says Keatley, now 55.

She made adjustments to accommodate the hearing loss. She remained involved in all the typical activities of an active child and young woman such as playing with friends, dating, socializing, going to school and eventually marrying and having children.

“My family and friends knew I needed some compromises and would try to meet my needs such as speaking toward my right side, seating me at the table a certain way, etc.,” she says. “Sometimes my hearing loss was an annoyance – such as riding in a car and having a hard time hearing conversations in the back seat – but it never kept me from doing what I wanted to do.”

MAKING ADJUSTMENTS

Although Joy did not let her hearing loss slow her down or affect the quality of her work, she did notice that some of the compromises she had to make for it were taking it’s toll.

Her job as a senior clinical office manager at Cleveland Hearing & Speech Center requires her to talk on the phone, and she has to awkwardly hold the phone between her neck and shoulder to be hands-free for typing.

Keatley says she was unable to wear a phone headset because she needed to be able to have her right ear (her “hearing ear”) available to listen to the person who was standing at her desk. Over time, this put strain on her back.