Silence Makes a Sound

Woo! Here I go again on another blogging kick!

I blogged a while back about how I believe that silence simply does NOT exist within the hearing world. You can actually hear silence within the hearing world. http://kelimalia.blogspot.com/2009/04/does-silence-really-exist.html

A few weeks ago I discovered what it’s like to hear silence as a hearing person may hear it. I have it drilled into my mind that whenever I have the CI on I’ll hear something. There’s just constant noise. I’ve noticed lately that sometimes I wonder if my CI is on because I feel like I’m not hearing anything which throws me off because I know I’m supposed to be hearing something. I then take the CI off and sure enough I was hearing something. I was just tuning it out (e.g. road sounds).

To me, there are 2 different types of silence.
1) Silence according to hearing people makes a sound. It’s just that people tune them out and think they’re not hearing anything when they really are.
2) Silence that profoundly deaf people “hear” is absolutely NOTHING which can be nice sometimes.

Hearing people may think deaf people are missing out by not being able to hear. I personally think that hearing people are missing out on what true silence is.

I love and hate silence. I hate silence as defined by hearing people and I love silence as defined by deaf people. I’m more prone to turning my CI off if I’m “hearing silence” vs noisy sounds.

For instance I may get all set for some quiet time and I’ll be laying in bed reading a book. What do I hear? My clothes rubbing against my pillow and sheets. Pages turning. Every once in a while I can hear myself breathing. This is usually when I turn the CI off. Then I hear absolutely nothing and am able to relax more.

I always thought silence couldn’t make a sound but it does. Silence is one thing that hearing people will never be able to truly experience.