captainmouse86 t1_iz23sus wrote
Interestingly, what lead us to having to put my grandmother in a retirement home was she became convinced her neighbour (older than her, and far less mobile) was plotting to steal from her. She heard them talking at night, conspiring, through the shared wall of their town home. She can’t hear you talking to her 10 feet away. But through the wall? But It was bizarre, she never made these kinds of claims and, she was adamant. So much so, my dad got her place swept, they investigated, because it was so out of the blue. Nothing. Finally it reached a point, something is wrong, and mom brought her to the hospital. She was getting dementia and was given medications.
Overtime, she needed less, and things stabilized, because - she got way better hearing aides. Turns out, while she was getting dementia, her hearing was also getting worse and the hearing aides weren’t working correctly, and to fill in the blanks, her brain decided to try and make sense of the noises it was hearing. It turned various sounds and, maybe muffled speech, into voices and words. Completely fabricating “conversations” she could her “through the wall.”
Even now, she’s much better, but you can tel instantly when her hearing aides aren’t functioning correctly. She is very withdrawn, seems easily confused about normal stuff, like what day it is, what time it is, etc. Help her get them working properly, and she’s completely different.
alliusis t1_iz3g7n2 wrote
My grandfather was in a retirement home. Pretty active, we visited him frequently.
Well once Covid hit we couldn’t see him in person, and my family decided to pull him out and care for him at our home. On the zoom call prior to pulling him out he seemed so lost and confused and could barely respond to what we were asking him. I honestly thought he wasn’t going to last the month.
After we brought him home, he had a general family zoom call planned. I gave him my headphones to wear, and suddenly he was chatting and laughing and bantering and his sharp wit was right back to normal. His hearing aids weren’t working properly and he just couldn’t understand what was going on. It’s such a huge barrier for connection and engagement when you can’t hear or understand what’s going on around you. I’m happy to see hearing aid advertising targeting younger people too and trying to remove some stigma surrounding them.
Sir_Snowman t1_iz3c4ig wrote
I'm 25, and I don't know much about the neurological in this example, but when I'm really high, I sometimes think I hear music playing (claasical or rock both of which I don't listen to on my own) when it's actually a wind breeze or pipes in the building. Deciphering the source of the sound and then remarking that the music oddly resembles said sound makes me realize that my brain was filling the gap of something faintly audible.
It is incredibly interesting how sometimes I could hear extremely well crafted tracks. Although I have no musical training at all, the subconscious seems super creative but also very, very convincing, I have zero doubt your grandmother 110% believed what she was saying having been caught off guard myself truly thinking there's no way I'm not hearing a neighbor's music and that it's actually me taking a random sound pattern I was ignoring and seemingly turning it into "proper music".
Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments