What Does It Mean to Be Hard of Hearing? A Personal Reflection

Recently, I was asked a simple but powerful question:
What does it mean to be hard of hearing?

It stayed with me for days.

I realised I had been living this experience for years…
but had never fully put it into words.

Being hard of hearing goes beyond simply “not hearing well.”

It’s not just about sound.
It’s about effort.
It’s about energy.
It’s about constantly navigating a world that isn’t designed for you.

It’s:

• listening harder than everyone else

• lowering the volume to cope

• constantly worrying your battery might die

• missing parts of conversations… and sometimes pretending you didn’t

• laughing at jokes you didn’t fully catch

• feeling agitated or exhausted after social situations

• trying to fit into a hearing world, instead of the world meeting you halfway

For a long time, I believed the problem was me.

That I needed to try harder.
Focus more.
Improve.

And I did.

I learned to adapt.
To read between the lines.
To fill in the gaps.

From the outside, it probably looked like I was doing well.

But inside, there was always a quiet feeling:

👉 I’m still not quite getting it.
👉 I’m still not enough.

And that’s the part people don’t often see.

The constant mental load.
The subtle exhaustion.
The effort of trying to keep up in spaces that move too fast, speak too quickly, or don’t pause long enough for you to fully arrive.

At some point, something shifted.

Not because everything became easier.
But because I started asking a different question:

👉 What if the problem isn’t me?

As I began learning more about the hard of hearing community—through stories, research, and conversations—I realised this experience is shared by many.

There are so many people navigating this quietly.

Adapting.
Adjusting.
Smiling.
Fitting in.

Not speaking up—because they don’t want to interrupt, slow things down, or be seen as “difficult.”

But that silence comes at a cost.

It creates distance.
From others.
And from ourselves.

What if we didn’t have to constantly adjust to the system?

What if communication was something we built together?

What if being different didn’t mean needing to hide, compensate, or overperform?

These are the questions I’ve been sitting with.

And they are part of what’s guiding me now.

I’m starting to explore this more deeply through my work, conversations, and the Hearing Bridge Movement—creating space for people who are hard of hearing to express themselves more fully, and to feel less alone in their experience.

This is just the beginning.

And I’m still learning.

If any part of this resonates with you—
or if you’ve had a similar experience—
I’d truly love to hear your story.

💛