When you hear hoofbeats

I’ve always had a hard time accepting that (a) anything was ever wrong with me and (b) if something was wrong, that it might be unusual.

For example:

• I waited three weeks to go to the doctor when I was 19 and had all the symptoms of acute appendicitis. Three weeks! And because of the way my appendix presented itself (small colon and attached length-wise—which I also had a hard time believing), my intestine was compromised and I had a nasogastric (NG) tube. But I didn’t realize that either until a few years ago when a friend of mine, who’s a med/surgical nurse, told me that. And when my surgeon told me that if I’d have waited another day to come in to be seen, I would have died. Didn’t believe him. 
• Same thing with the incisional hernia I developed after six major abdominal surgeries. How on earth could the ongoing pain I had be a hernia? But of course it was and once it was repaired, bam—the pain went away. 
• Same thing with my ears. When the audiologist got nearly giddy last year because I had such a rare hearing loss, I thought surely he was wrong. But of course he wasn’t and my results this year confirmed that diagnosis. Now I’m sitting here in my office typing this post wearing my new hearing aid. And I can hear. 

In fact, when I was in the audiologist’s office and he was doing his thing and finally turned on the hearing aid, I gasped and teared up because I could hear in stereo. I didn’t even realize I’d lost that.

Low frequency hearing loss isn't well known and not well researched or addressed; there are just so few of us who have it. So I'll need to go in frequently over the next month so he can evaluate how the hearing aid is working for me and what, if any, changes need to be made to the programming. And yes, he’s still giddy about me and my hearing situation. I think he might write a white paper about me because my situation is that rare.

Sometimes it’s a zebra.