changes

Some days I long for my life to be "normal." But,I don't grieve like I used to for my hearing. I don't feel that sadness that kind of hurts on the inside and outside anymore when I am playing or hearing music. I don't resent my family and friends when they are laughing and joking in a group setting and I can't keep up. I don't feel like I am detached from my own life at times, sadly I used to feel that a lot.
When I say I want my life to be "normal," I am talking about that circumstances that have led me to the point in which I am living today. The circumstances that makes life tricky now, but not sad... the circumstances that leave me feeling like I am just getting warmed up for whatever is in store next. Sometimes I just want to be that girl full of hope and life again who lived in a small town and was really comfortable with the fact that her life was not destined for anything extraordinary. I even long for those times that I wasn't closely acquainted with adversity, sadness and isolation... when I could be a selfish, normal girl who didn't even know she was being so ungrateful for her utter normalness.
Sometimes I sit down at night and I wonder, why am I so tired... and I guess then it clicks that I living a pretty extraordinary life... who wouldn't be so fatigued after doing a job all day she should not be able to do? One that I have to struggle daily to do it to my work-a-holic, I want to be a super girl who is also positive and down with God attitude. So, sometimes... at the end of the day, I long for those days when I just didn't know how bad life can sometimes kick us in the ass and how some of us respond by wanting to continue to work and play and have a happy life when quite frankly I want a few lazy and selfish days here and there.
With all of that aside... whew... I am the philosophical one today.... I got the changes Friday afternoon that I had tested at Advanced Bionics in CA. The changes I wanted so badly that I held back tears knowing that only my own audiologist can make and I had to leave the changes in CA and wait to get them in Ohio. It is hard to say how great they are yet, though I know they are pretty amazing... because I had a laid back day at home(challenging hearing wise but nowhere near the ball park of teaching music to adolescents all day). It will be much easier to say how significant I think they may be when I put in a day at work.... the crazy thing is... my audiologist explained what this earth-shattering change was and quite frankly it doesn't sound that amazing... but proof is in the hearing. Apparently my mad scientist buddy in CA just slowed down the rate at which I was receiving the information... I don't know enough to explain it well and if you know better than me... disregard this, cuz it probably is technically off... For a long time A.B. led the competition in saying... A faster firing rate is better, so other companies followed. When Joyce first began my mapping, she gave me a quicker rate, then at some point I told her it sounded better with the slower rate. In CA, they slowed the rate down even more... Joyce explained that it makes the band of sound I am hearing a bit wider and for me anyhow it is a much more pleasing, and natural sound. The difference for me is that things sound sharper, some of that "muddiness" that was there before isn't there. Words are more clear and things seem louder too... when I was is CA, it made my t-coil sound better and music more clear. The thing is, that faster rate may be better for some people, but because we all have unique brains and that is how the implant allows me to hear, then it seems everyone with an implant will have a mapping strategy that is also unique to them and what sounds good to them.
I do long for the normalcy of my old life, the other stuff, I almost can't remember anymore... natural hearing, passive listening, group conversations.... but I also know that there is a depth and strength in my soul that wasn't there before and I am so ok with that.