Once upon a time, we may have viewed hearing loss as an unfortunate and annoying—but nevertheless benign—aspect of getting older. We might have images of our own elders starting to have trouble hearing: voices getting louder, phrases being repeated, situations arising that were sometimes comical and sometimes tragic. Back then, we knew they were getting “old” when their hearing started to give them trouble. Today, things are pretty different. Americans are living a lot longer, and hearing loss is sometimes happening earlier in life. In fact, it’s estimated that as many as 20% of teenagers have measurable hearing loss. Life is noisy; we surround ourselves with noisemakers and earbuds, attend concerts and music festivals, go to movie theaters with loud blockbuster action flicks, and a host of other activities that inundate our ears with loud sound on a regular basis.

Hearing Loss is Not a Sign of Aging

It’s true: hearing loss can happen at any point in a person’s life. While hearing loss does tend to affect those who are older disproportionately, one doesn’t have to be “old” to have hearing loss, and many of the things we might associate with a person getting older are actually side effects of having untreated hearing loss. One of the first things that those with untreated hearing loss will say is how exhausting it is. When we can’t hear properly, it takes a lot more mental effort to follow a conversation. The part of our brains that normally understands some sound as speech and puts it together for us can’t do its job, since not enough sound is coming in. It’s left to the frontal cortex, the part of our brains that is usually responsible for higher-order thinking, to solve the riddle of what speech sounds were meant to be. “Was that teach or reach?” This extra work is taxing. It’s no wonder, then, that people with untreated hearing loss feel more tired and confused during conversations. We’re struggling to keep up while our brains are working in overdrive to solve a riddle with every sentence we hear! That’s before we even get down to thinking about what that sentence means and how we might respond to it. If you think back, now, about those elders of a couple generations ago, you can see how some of their behavior that we, and they, might have imagined was part of “getting older” may have actually been part of having inadequately treated hearing loss.

Hearing Loss is Not Benign

Unfortunately, it doesn’t stop at getting tired sooner and becoming confused in conversations. Study after study over the course of recent decades has shown that untreated hearing loss seems to engender a cascade of negative effects on health and well-being. If we’ve been raised in hearing culture (in other words, our hearing loss came later in life), once we lose access to spoken conversation we have a hard time finding our way. Far from being one distinct aspect of getting older, hearing loss is part of a web of experience. Hearing loss, when left untreated, has been shown to contribute to an increased risk of loneliness, depression and social isolation. You see, once social engagements start to become tiring and confusing, we aren’t as interested in them and start to spend more time alone. Soon enough, we find ourselves going outside less often and walking less. Our bodies start to have more and more trouble as we don’t use them as often, and our minds aren’t getting much exercise either. Even if we take away the problems with physical health, which we are often more inclined to talk about since they are more tangible and easier to point to, it’s not hard to see how unenjoyable life becomes if we start to avoid situations in which we might be expected to be able to hear clearly. We could talk all day about how people with untreated hearing loss have issues with memory, brain atrophy, earlier onset of cognitive decline and dementia, and increased risk of injury due to falling down. But while these potentialities might sound scary, it misses the fact that those who get hearing aids simply have a better, more enjoyable time in their lives. Studies have been conducted in which surveys about life satisfaction were compared between people with untreated hearing loss and those who wear hearing aids. Overwhelmingly, those who got hearing aids said they spent more time outside, got more exercise, and felt more independent. Not only that, but they reported a higher general satisfaction with their lives, higher self-esteem, and even a greater sense of optimism about the world at large. About 95% of people who get hearing aids, when asked after one year, say they’re happy that they did.

Get a Hearing Test

If you’re having hearing issues, don’t wait until you’re really struggling with them to start thinking about hearing aids. The sooner you start wearing hearing aids, the less interrupted your life will be by the negative effects of untreated hearing loss, and the more time you’ll have to keep living life to the fullest.