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Loneliness is it a silent killer?

Posted , 7 users are following.

gloria12683
gloria12683

Some people may be surrounded by family and feel lonely. Others may be surrounded by friends and feel lonely. What would you suggest to overcome/reduce loneliness?

3 likes, 46 replies

46 Replies

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  • stevejhon210
    stevejhon210 gloria12683

    Posted

    To reduce lonliness you need to make peace with youself. It is not lonliness it is actually a habit when we are with people our mind is not there we are thinking of something else and when we come back to senses we just think we are lonely in the crowd. Dont dream live in present and enjoy it you wont feel lonely anymore be in hat moment.
  • Katlin66
    Katlin66 gloria12683

    Posted

    I was suggesting a possible reason for loneliness whilst in company.  This is uppermost in my mind at present as North Staffs CCG want to stop providing hearing aids on the NHS to adults with mild to moderate hearing loss.  I have attended one of their board meetings in public and spoken with the chair of the CCG to try to encourage him to understand how profoundly hearing loss can affect the lives of people.  However, although a GP, he seemed not to understand the effects of hearing loss.  Most people think that that if they can hear there is not a problem  It is much more involved than that.  Without my hearing aids I hear a jumble of sounds that sometimes make sense and sometimes do not.  It all depends on the frequencies of the sounds, the frequencies I can hear and the decibel level I can hear different frequencies at.  Quite mild hearing loss can have a substantial effect on understanding what is being said if there is background noise.  it is the lack of clarity, not just the volume, that causes misunderstanding.  I would suggest anyone who thinks they may have a hearing problem to have a look at the Action on Hearing Loss website.  They are fighting hard to get the North Staffs CCG to change their mind.  Also Devon and Cornwall CCGs want to restrict hearing aid provision.
    • gloria12683
      gloria12683 Katlin66

      Posted

      Hi Katlin,

      I am glad that you are taking an active interest in the welfare of the hearing impaired. The more focal you are the less likely you will lose this valuable resource. I live in Australia and hearing aids are not covered by our Medicare system. Government funding seems to be more of what is popular for votes rather than any sense of equity or commonsense. Would you belief in Australia the government will spend $6000 so as I can watch free to air TV (Satalite system as I cannot get a normal transmission), but would not help with $1200 so I am able to breath when I am asleep.

      Regards

      Gloria

    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      Katlin, you are SO right. I count 'mild' hearing loss as more of a disability than depending on a wheelchair. It is so desperate to be in a room full of jolly, happy chattering people and find oneself utterly alone. These board members should try simulation for a few days. Or the board should be filled with people with hearing losses.j
    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 gloria12683

      Posted

      Hi Gloria,

      I think our government could be going the same way as yours.  It is local clinical commissioning groups, CCGs, that now decide who gets what treatment.  Sadly they are being starved of funds by the government so have to make choices.  Many hearing impaired people lack confidence to speak up for themselves.  Their disability is invisible and often made worse by a reluctance to accept and address it.  I know because it took me many years to accept and seek treatment for my own hearing loss.  Wearing hearing aids has transformed my life.  I now feel much more confident in company and am keen to encourage others to address their hearing loss, too.

    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 georgeGG

      Posted

      Hi George,

      I am not sure I would go quite that far.  Being confined to a wheelchair is serious.  However, you are right about mild to moderate hearing loss being unrecognised as a disability.  People who have clearly not heard something correctly are often treated as figures of fun or as stupid.  This saps their confidence and they then have a tendency to avoid stressful situations in future.  Hearing aids can provide a lifeline.  The development of digital hearing aids has been an absolute godsend.

    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      Dear Katlin, Yes it is very much an opinion and may meet with little agreement. What drives my opinion is that it is inconvenient to say the least to be confined to a wheelchair. But such a person can be fully integrated socially.  A person with hearing problems is socially excluded. Social interaction is a fundamental feature of human life. When that fundamental feature is frustrated the person is seriously affected. That can lead to psycological problems.  George.
    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 georgeGG

      Posted

      I wish I could convince the CCGs that are thinking of depriving adults with mild to moderate hearing loss of hearing aids that untreated hearing loss can lead to isolation, depression and accelerated dementia.  Action on Hearing Loss put together a superb appeal with over 400 anecdotes from real hearing aid wearers and a 28 page official response to try persuade N Staffs CCG that it was very short sighted policy to deny people with such a fundamental need the appropriate treatment.  The CCG's response is that they are going to devise eligibility criteria.  We are yet to learn what these will be.  A pair of digital hearing aids costs the NHS £398.  The same aids would cost £3,000 privately.  They would need to be replaced at approximately 4 year intervals.  I have written a detailed letter and included various documents to support the appeal to the CCG and copied it to various other relevant bodies but have had no replies from any of them.  Real people with real health issues are being ignored.  Untreated hearing loss is an invisible disability.  I make a point of not hiding my hearing aids.  I have found people much more tolerant when I tell them I have hearing loss and they can see my hearing aids.  
    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      Dear Katlin,

      That is a great note. I have very little hair. People can see my two aids but they very seldom notice. When I tell someone I am deaf nearly all forget in about one half of one sentence.

      George

    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 georgeGG

      Posted

      Have you tried telling people that although you wear hearing aids they do not make your hearing perfect?  I ask them to please bear with me if I have to ask them to repeat something.  Also, if I am out in a group I always try to sit with my back to a wall or screen to eliminate noise behind me as far as possible and I will tell people why.  In meetings I sit at the front so that I can see speakers' faces.  It isn't easy to get people to understand.  On the Action on Hearing Loss website there is the facility to play an audio clip that gives some idea of what hearing loss is like.  I ask people to listen to it with background noise.  It highlights the problem much better.  We need to bring our problem to the attention of the public and those who hold the NHS money purse strings.  If we hearing aid wearers don't who will - apart from the charities who work on our behalf?
    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      Dear Katlin, 

      Yes I tell them but it does not last. They forget by the middle of the first sentence they speak. I apologise and ask for a repeat but very soon I am filtered out of their conversation. I sometimes wonder if there is an added female / male problem that exaserbates the problems caused by hearing loss. The style of female conversation is diferent to male conversation. In particular female conversation is multi strand whereas male conversation is mono strand.

      I have sat at the front for many years now. I noticed that speakers appreciated my attendance. They probably misunderstood my persisant eye contact and earnest attention. They could not know that my body language did not indicate total immersion in their fascinating speach / instruction but a total struggle to understand what they were saying. 

      I must have a look at that video on Action on Hearing Loss. Thank you for the suggestion.

      Yes we need to be active in promoting NHS support. My impression from past experience is that privately purchased hearing aids are very costly and the aid and the service of dubious quality. One company seemed to be dishonest. Servicing and adjustment seemed to be having the hearing aid sent to the 'laboritory' where it was put in a drawer for three weeks and then returned to me. By contradistinction I get good and interested service from my local NHS hospital. Any poor service has I believe been the result of a poor technitian failing to match the aids' programmes to my needs. Probably not really listening to me and rather prejudging what I aught to need. One can get that problem anywhere.

      When I get over the side effects of my recent radiotherapy I plan to get involved both in cancer matters and in hearing loss matters. I also plan to learn to lip read. There is a local group I can join.

      Best wishes

      George

    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 georgeGG

      Posted

      I am so sorry to hear that, George.  I think your hearing loss must be greater than mine.  I have mild to moderate high frequency hearing loss.  My worst frequency is the 4,000Htz which I need at 70Db to hear without hearing aids.  I do find that my digital NHS hearing aids do a very good job of filling in the gaps in my hearing.  I do still have to ask for repetition at times but nowhere near the frequency that I had to before I received my first hearing aids just over eight years ago.

      It is frustrating when people forget and filter you out of conversation.  It is also exhausting trying to make sense of what people are saying.  I only realised just how exhausting after I began using hearing aids.  I really don't know how I managed at work.  I was continually complaining about others mumbling when it was my hearing at fault all the time.

      I don't know how much you have looked into the problem.  You may know a lot more about it than me.  However, I find that some people - including my husband of nearly 50 years - do have to be repeatedly reminded that there is no point in trying to hold a coversation with me if we are in different rooms.  It is difficult for people without the problem to understand.  I might liken it to my discovery of what it was like to be wheeled in a wheelchair when I broke a small bone in my foot some years ago.  It was only then that I had some idea of what it had been like for our daughter years previously when she had a badly broken leg.  I apologised profusely to her for not understanding how painful it was over every little bump and crack in the surface I had pushed her.

      I am pleased you plan to become involved in the fight for NHS hearing aids.  One of the biggest problems is making the medical people understand what hearing loss is and how fundamentally it affects our lives.  I would strongly suggest having a look at Action on Hearing Loss's website.  You might like to  receive emails from them with updates and requests for filling in surveys.  That is how I became involved in the campaign initially.  They are very keen to hear anecdotal evidence from the hard of hearing.  They are also very active in the fight against the CCG's proposals to withdraw hearing aids from people like me.  I would be likely to become a recluse without my hearing aids.  

      Keep fighting.  All the very best,

      Kathleen

    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      Dear Kathleen

      Thank you for that note. I note you can manage at 70Db. At 70Db I am running for cover as I am sensitive to noise at that level. If I tollerate such for more than a few seconds I will be emoptionally and physically upset for about three hours. Try and get people to understand that. Can you understand that?

      When a child, my grandmother frequently compained to us grandchildren, "You do MUMBLE so, child." Now I find everyone mumbles so if I do not have my hearing aids working.

      I smile wanly at your lack of success with your husband. My wife not only still expects me to hear and understand her when in another room but expects me to know where she is. I have no idea where any sound comes from. I have to use my eyes.  She also expects me to understand her when she has her back to me and is running water, or clattering pans and crockery. Two people talking over each other - impossible.With hearing aids and a quiet environment and only one or two people in the room plus me and the effort of listening and understanding has me exhausted in an hour. Yet I am encouraged to sit in a crowded room for general chat for 6 hours or so. My wife is still put out that I am increasingly disinclided to join in. Yes, being a recluse is attractive if one could have the occasional visitor for a half hour or so.

      I have taken "Does he like sugar" adverts of a decade or two ago to heart. I always try to gain eye contact with the occupant of the wheel chair. It is usually appreciated. I pay a lot of attention to body language. That helps a lot but sadly I see how often people are not truthful. I must now remember should the need arise to be kind about tiny lumps and bumps.

      Thank you for the Action on Hearing Loss advice.

      With best wishes

      George

    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      I have made contact with Action on Hearing Loss. I will see what follows.
    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 georgeGG

      Posted

      Dear George,

      I can identify with all the points you mention concerning your wife.  When I ask where are you the answer is often, "Here."  Since I have become more actively involved in the fight for NHS hearing aids my husband and I have both learnt a lot.  I find him explaining what hearing loss is like to people now.  I think he is as worried as I am about the potential loss of hearing aids as he says they have transformed his life too.  Apparently my voice is much quieter since I started to wear them.

      I am not sure I understand about your sensitivity to 70Db level.  I have downloaded a Db meter onto my iPhone.  Normal traffic seems to register around 70 Db - give or take, depending on the vehicles and frequency of them passing.  From my audiograms I note that I can only hear the 4,000 Htz frequency if it is played at 70Db.  Other frequencies range from 20 to 65.  I asked for printouts of my audiograms so that I can use them in my campaigning if I need to.  They have helped me to understand why I hear words incorrectly without my hearing aids.  Digital hearing aids programmed for individual ears are a godsend so far as I am concerned.  

      I have spoken with other people who have similar experiences as you with private hearing aids so we must do all we can to try to save our NHS ones.  I tweet a lot on Twitter to try to raise awareness and have quite good responses.  

      I hope you find Action on Hearing Loss useful.  

      All the best,

      Kathleen

    • georgeGG
      georgeGG Katlin66

      Posted

      Dear Kathleen,

      I usually get up first in the morning by about an hour so I don't put in my hearing aids until I start making breakfast. If I forget my wife points to her ears. It is a sure sign that I am speaking too loudly. I get my hearing aids and then all is well.

      I agree 70Db is a usual enough level of noise. I have not got the details from Audiology but I think 70Db is at lady's voice frequency.. My hearing aid programmes are set to limit amplification at various levels. This reduces the number of occasions I am distressed. If the unamplified noise is too loud for me I just have to move away from the noise as rapidly as possible.

       

    • Katlin66
      Katlin66 georgeGG

      Posted

      Dear George,

      It sounds as thoigh you have hyperacusis.  http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/hyperacusis/Pages/Introduction.aspx

      We seem to be taking over this thread.  I am thinking it might be better to start a new one specific to hearing loss.  I will give it a try.  I would like to post a link to an article in The Guardian that highlights two CCGs that are already limiting NHS hearing aid provision and another 22 who are going to review provision on NHS.  Worrying times.

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