Flunked The Hearing Test

I thought I was just pissy about my hearing.  Jeff would talk to me from the living room, I’d be in the bathroom and couldn’t hear a damn thing he said.  I put it up the fact that the TV was on, the dishwasher was on, the fridge runs like a jet engine and the bathroom fan sounds like a jet engine without the benefit of jet engine oil.  I would stomp out, hairbrush in hand (when I was allowed to use them) and say,

“WHAT????!!!”

I even came up with the rule “you may not talk to me unless we are in the same room.”  This later got amended to “you may not talk to me unless you can see the whites of my eyeballs.”

Turns out it has some credibility.

Chemo Round Three, when I announced there was some ringing in my left ear, I was quickly referred for a hearing test.  I also didn’t get my one chemo treatment that potentially is the cause of the ringing of the ear (I didn’t duck chemo that day; I still got the other three drugs). 

So three days after Chemo Three, with my mug of ginger tea in my right hand and the vomit/garbage can to my left, I sat in the hearing booth with a set of headphones on.  Thirty minutes later, after repeating word after word after word, both with static background and without, I got my results.

My hearing in my left ear sucks.  As is in moderate-to-severe sucks.

The audiologist did some tests about how loud I could stand a noise level before I asked her to stop (not long at all) and would play background static while saying a word.  At least I think she was saying a word.  All I heard was static. 

All while my left ear is quietly buzzing on its own accord.

Where do we go from here?  Three years ago I had a hearing test done because I had water in my Eustachian tube for a really long time that I couldn’t get out.  My primary doctor thought I had cholesteatoma so we went all out trying to figure it out.  I finally got a hold of my hearing tests from three years ago.  Turns out, my hearing was bad back then.  Not as bad; it has gotten worse.  It went from 40 to 70 (the higher the number the worse the hearing) in those three years.

Do we know if it is because of the chemotherapy drug Carboplatin?  Nope. 

Is the ringing from the Carboplatin?  Dunno.  It can also be caused by steroids and anti anxiety meds, both of which are injected every 21 days and in pill form for seven days after each chemo round. 

I didn’t get the Carboplatin on Chemo 3 or 4, and 5 and 6 are up in the air.  We do know the ringing only started when chemo started, but was the hearing loss a result of the chemo?  Or did I already have some of it?  And would more Carboplatin cause more ringing, or more hearing loss?  Or just do its job and kill the cancer?

Choices.  Life altering choices.

But don’t tell me about it.  I probably can’t hear what you’re saying.

On the flip side, whatever I can hear, I promptly forget anyway.