I can't hear/understand my wife

If it is an important conversation you might something like a Partnermike from Phonac which is great for conversation between just two people. I use it all the time for one-to-one. You don’t say what make of HAs you use and I don’t know which other makes offer this kind of equipment, but in my case the other person has the mike clipped or worn near their mouth and my HAs use a setting where the speaker’s voice comes to me with amazing clarity.

Ironic that should appear just as my case (see prior postings) again reached a tipping point: My wife’s speech has again gone on sabbatical.

Those following MY case know I went through the trials of the damned in FL, finally reaching a point after months, and 4 different-than-Beltone audiologists and 6 different brands, of weekly visits to a very talented audiologist, where it was no longer necessary to have her wear the PalPro mike in order for me to understand her.

That ability went away after several months in GA and my Beltone rep an hour away gave up and told me to find an ENT with REM. NE GA seems to have none, but in the course of calling literally every hearing provider within 2 hours of my home, I encountered another Beltone rep who sounded like she knew her stuff.

And she did. However, she confirmed my suspicion that no Beltone folk in GA, at least within any reasonable distance, had REM gear. And I found no other providers in my radius who had it, either.

But she spent 4 hours with me and my wife getting me to the point where I no longer needed a separate mike. But a couple of weeks later, I noted that I needed to bump into the ‘speech clarity’ sub-channel of my all-around sound to maintain my understanding.

Another 5-hour round-trip later, those frequencies had been tweaked into my overall settings in the All-Around class - and a month later, I’m back to not being able to understand my wife other than face-to-face, lip-reading-aided, conditions, and, otherwise, raising the sound level to where everything else is painfully loud.

So I’ve again embarked on a not-Beltone search, with 2 of the seven providers within a 2-hour radius already scheduled - the first being tomorrow, in town, amazingly, and frustratingly, as the second is a week later, a week after I had to be, already, in that same town over an hour away.

If it becomes desperation, a separate mike can work. But it’s a royal PITA to the wearer, as it distorts clothing anywhere it’s clipped within auditory range, and, if not auditory-wave completely available from the speaker’s mouth, not foolproof, to boot.

I’ll have to post this question as a new entry/question from me, but I wonder if there’s a current WiFiMike equivalent these days? A tiny, flesh-colored, line next to the cheek, with a BTE equivalent processor?

Good luck in your journey. And good luck with the reprint; mine gets angry when I compare my case to having a broken leg and her being angry with me for not keeping up with her while she’s out jogging; both are physical disablements, but somehow it’s my fault about my ears. The reprint would not be received well here.

Sigh…

@Skip said:

and a month later, I’m back to not being able to understand my wife other than face-to-face, lip-reading-aided, conditions, and, otherwise, raising the sound level to where everything else is painfully loud

Do you have RIC hearing aid? Do you change the wax filters regularly?

I feel a little of your frustration, although to a lesser extent. On August 19th, I will get my cShell acoustic coupling, after four months of waiting for a remake.

You have 100% WRS binaurally (EDIT: I misread the vaguely written result - that’s 60%, not 100%) - you absolutely should get much benefits from properly fitted hearing aids. Perhaps try hearing aids from the more proven companies, like Phonak (maybe Sphere 90?), Oticon Intent 1, Starkey Edge AI 24 or Widex Allure (the last don’t have the AI feature)?

You should have cShell or earmolds with very small vent (0.6-1mm diameter probably? fitting it is a bit a trial and error) with UP receiver in case of Phonak hearing aids, probably 105 receiver in Oticon case.

Hi, and thanks for the bounce.
I have BTE and RIC in full molds with 3 different variable-size insert vents. No vent-size changes make a difference.

I change the wax filters (which are well up the canal from the end of the mold) if anything is on them, as inspected under strong light and magnification. I use a pipe-cleaner, thread-type, vent-and-receiver vigorous clean, as well as a vigorous toothbrush-on-the-exterior, cleaning, followed by a warm-water, bulb-pushed, lavation, weekly. After my endoscopic review of a few weeks ago, which included dredging, there has been effectively nothing in the canal for weeks.

I’m visiting as many as possible/practical (limiting my search to providers within 2 hours travel of my home) competitive providers to see if any actual reality will develop other than mere windmilling, a la the robot’s “Danger, Danger, Will Robinson”, of the effort.

My previous exercise of the same sort had Phonak as the leader, but the very-talented audio there was only able to get my trial extended to 60 days, and we weren’t “there” yet, so I abandoned that $6000 route; others managed a 90-day trial from the maker, and still didn’t improve over my Beltones, so I stuck with those (this in the same timeframe of weekly visits to the hour-away Beltone lady)…

Sigh…