My friendship with Mr. T

Hey everybody! My name is Renato Melo and everyone (or most people I know) knows me as Ren. I am a 40ish years old guy with a lovely wife, the best son I could ask, and a beautiful German Shepherd dog. I am also a guy who was forced to develop a friendship with one of my biggest enemies: Mr. T.

You all may not be aware of Mr. T – full name Tinnitus to be more specific. It is a ringing noise that never leaves those who suffer from it alone, and I can tell, sometimes even when I am asleep, I feel its presence on my dreams. You may all have had an encounter with Mr. T sometime in your life, after having a night out with friends, listening to loud music or even spending a early evening watching a fireworks display in the local park.

So why did I developed a friendship with one of my biggest foes? Because common sense dictates that when you cannot win a war, you simply join the opposite side – or give up – and giving up for me is not an option to put on the table and I hope to be strong enough to never give up.

Basically, I would technically describe my case scenario as being hearing impaired and suffering from acute tinnitus in both ears followed by hyperacusis and of course, a severe 50% of hearing loss in both ears which is not something I wish on anyone. Easy to live with it? I can assure you it is not and without exaggeration, this is a literal pain I wish that never existed.

Please allow me to talk more about it: As far as I understood from the multiple visits to different audiologists since 2011, my hearing impairment was caused by “inducted hearing loss”, very likely because I used to work in a noisy working environment without hearing protection!

At first, I was not aware about this issue and although Mr. T. was already there, present and perceptible in one or other moment, I simply took the signals as high blood pressure, head aches etc though I never thought that was the full red flag in front of me saying I was up to be damned for life – and Mr. T was waving that flag!

From the end of 2009, I started feeling that something was wrong: I could not have a normal conversation with other people and although I understand English grammar very well, having a conversation with an English speaker was simply impossible at that time – simply because I could not hear consonants very well.

Also, I started noticing that I was not fully able to listen to high pitches of sound – for example, if I received a mobile call and the mobile was not on the “vibrating” mode, I could lose the call simply for not hearing it quickly enough to respond or even the door bell ringing.

But the worst scenario was related to the fact that I was not able to hear my wife and son if they spoke to me while I was turned away from them. I had occasions where she called my name three, sometimes four or more times before I realised, she was calling me. This created a big discomfort as she started to think I was ignoring her so we started to have big arguments. Our relationship was going from bad to worse and this (as bad as it sounds) was the reason why I took enough courage to go to Specsavers to take a hearing test – she called me deaf so many times that I started to realise she was right.

It was in September of 2011 when I did the first test and was told about my actual condition. I felt so bad that I got into a deep depression which was really harder to get rid of – I was unemployed because I was not able to respond to simply interview questions, speaking with someone was just a nightmare, I started to have doubts about myself and these were the worst years of all my life on this marvellous planet we live .

I also developed suicidal thoughts! Although I understand that this is a matter nobody wants to speak out – for not so reasonable reasons, our society tends to diminish those with some levels of mental health issues – now I know I was not the only one feeling that way as it is very common for those who suffer of Tinnitus and hyperacusis to develop suicidal tendencies. Fortunately, I have something stronger in me which is the love for my life and because I trust love more than hate, how could I do that level of harm to myself? Never!

Along this process, Mr. T was there, making me feel crazy, needless, depressed… not something I choose but something I was forced to swallow, without any drop of compassion – that is Mr. T and its way to pull someone to the abyss. I decided that no deafness was more important than my life, my wellbeing and even understanding that the road towards the recover was not easy – it never is – it would be more difficult to put myself together if I did not accept Mr. T as a friend, as a companion – for good and for bad.

So why I am writing this? Because I know I am not alone, and I am sure that there are plenty of people like me out there – people who are not aware that a simple headphone can bring a misery of life and Mr. T will make sure that it can be delivered for free. There are plenty of people who ignore signals as they are too busy to care about themselves – people who need help but are not fully sure about how to ask for it… It is easy to deny that we have the right to fight back and feeling more miserable than happy is for many the easier path to take. But it does not work – not for me nor for anyone.

Therefore I am writing this.  My mission here with this open-hearted letter is to let you all know that you are not alone, but you need to stand by yourself and ask for help. Nobody is alone, but we choose to be simply because of a fear of being judged,  You are not alone and if after reading this letter, you found something of yourself here, say no more.  Embrace life, your life, as it is without doubt the first and only richness you can have for free and remember, asking for help is a signal of strength and not weakness…!

Best regards

Renato Melo