Steven, 33yrs old from Blackpool. Born profoundly deaf with two powerful hearing aids. Thornton, Lancashire At four years old, I was offered to go to Birkdale School, Southport which offers support for the deaf but as my parents found out that the school is mainly for the deaf people who uses sign language and not using speech. My parents were worried that I would grow up without any speech so they took me to a mainstream, Waterloo School in Blackpool with a small unit for the hearing impaired where I would be able to mix with people, both hearing and hearing impaired. None of the hearing impaired children knew how to use sign language which was helpful to mix with the hearing people. With this, I was able to make friends and enjoy having similar interests as any hearing children would have. As my mainstream school, Waterloo School, is 12 miles from my home, I had to take taxi home, provided by the school to take few deaf children and they also lived further away from school. Some of them came all the way from Lancaster, Fleetwood, Poulton-Le-Fylde and this was why, getting to school/home would take an hour journey each way. I do remember when I was 8 or 9 yrs old, I asked my little brother, Paul, who is a year younger than me that if I could join him to his school so I could hang out with him and his friends in our local area. Unfortunately his school did not have any special unit. I just felt that I would like to have some friends closer to home rather than making friends 12 miles away where I would not be able to see them out of school hour. In School, none of the hearing impaired children were together as we were to go into individual classes so we could blend in with the hearing children and make new friends. We had radio aids to help us hear the teacher and not the background noise. I am lucky that I am really good at lipreading and use what I could hear through my hearing aids well. If I doesn't understand what was being said, I would ask. I don't mind if there is any noise in the background but I can not cope with the silent. I would not know if my hearing aids are working or not. When I went to college I didn't have any support to help with my course. I learnt to think for myself and asking teacher some questions whenever I didn't understand if i don't fully understand it. I was being told that I was one the best in the classroom by teacher and I told him "Yea right" he replied "No! I am being serious" he has got me thinking "Blimey! I am deaf and still one of the best in the class". This have put a smile on my face and I could not wait to tell my parents. So chuffed ha . I have gained qualification in car mechanic which I am proud of . This lead to me getting a job at the Wyrefield garage in Poulton-Le-Fylde. I enjoyed working there as I have a skill for fixing cars. One day, while working at the garage, the phone kept ringing and I was working away fixing the car. I looked around and found that I was alone. I knew I would not be able to hear through the phone. I won't dare picking up the phone and lose any customers but my boss couldn't understand why I refused to pick up the telephone. I am deaf and cannot hear on the phone. I can lipread. I hear by lipreading. I got annoyed and this make my blood boiled. I want my boss to understand but he doesn't. My boss asked me "Why don't you make an effort to try it?" ppff I wish I could lol I showed him how it was done. I picked up the phone, all I could hear was some blabbing voice and it was not very clear. I hung up. It was a waste of time!! My boss suggested that I should be using Radio aids at work. "what the hell?" I thought. I told him that it is a waste of time and I wasn't too happy about it. Eventually, my boss managed to get hold of brand new radio aids and i tried it on. My boss said "Is your Radio aids on? How come you can't hear me very well?" How do you expect me to hear everything, u stupid fool?! I said It is hard to explain to people on how much that I could hear and what I can't hear. My boss doesn't realised how much support that I need in my everyday life so one day he asked me to come into the office to have a chat about the situation with the radio aids and that I was not being able to hear very well. He told me if I don't use the radio aids he would let me go. I was gutted and walked out of the garage. The supervisor asked me what was happening so I told him about it. The supervisor was bit shocked about it and indeed very disappointed . One week later, my boss rang up and told my mother to forget about what had happened last week and begged me to come back. I went back for a while but I could not relax every time the phone rang. I had to do something. I was not happy. I was nervous every time the phone rings. I "jacked" in my job! Yeah! I could not cope with it. Later, I've managed to get a full time job at the factory doing production engineering and I was happy there for a while until I was struggling with communication with the staff because it was a noisy environment. with the hearing aids I was using, the noise was overlapping everything that it would give me a massive headache and use most of my energy struggling to hear what the staff was giving me orders. I went to an audiology unit to give me a hearing test and they suggested me to have a new hearing aids which would be more powerful than my old ones. They gave me two new digital hearing aids and WOW! The sound was unbelievable. I was able to listen to music. How I miss it! I will never stop listening to music. EVER! I have heard new sound that I was not able to hear before such as people walking on gravel ,birds tweeting ,listen to music oh is was best thing ever to listen hearing all different kinds off bass and harmony . For three years I suffered from depression and had suicidal thoughts. I just had enough having to lip read people and not being able to hear properly. All this time I had not spoken to anyone or bother being with anyone. Basically, I just couldn't care less. Not even my best mates. Anyway, after 3 years of depression I threw away the tablets away and never take them again because I was feeling like a zombie and could not think for myself. I was referred to have a specialised counselling to discuss about my depression and it did help me bits by bit. I felt better after the counselling session. In November 2011, I noticed something about me was not right. I lost my car keys ,wallet and my phone. I was like "How come I didn't hear it when it fell out of my pocket and drop to the floor when i got out of my car?" I told my mother that my right ear is not sounding right and it was ringing inside. So bloody annoyed !! She managed to get me an appointment with the audiology and had my hearing test done. The audiology guy asked me "Do you want the bad news or good news?" I said "Bad news" I wish I never said it! He says that I have lost both of my hearing and it is so bad that even a powerful hearing aid available would not be powerful enough for me. I was gutted. I was hoping for new powerful hearing aids so I would hear well but this was not to be. At present, I am struggling to hear what people are struggling and I have to ask them to repeat what they said again and again. Its very frustration for me and for other people. I have been considering on getting a cochlear implant in Manchester and this is why I am writing a blog about my journey to hear. watch this space