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Hi, my name is Kim Mettache and I'm from Dyer, Indiana. I have a profound hearing loss. I
have it since I was a baby. My mom had the German measles, so I had a high fever. I almost
died, so I had a blood transfusion so that’s how I lived but I lost my hearing. Right now,
I’m a lip reader. All my kids know how to read lips so I think
that’s a good thing because they might need it down the road because if you lose your
hearing today, they can’t communicate. So I think they won’t have a problem when they
get older because they can just read lips. My one daughter, Elizabeth, wants to be a
cochlear implant surgeon. I think that’s awesome because I got a cochlear implant two
years ago and that’s what she decided she wanted to do. So I took her with me to the
hospital to meet my doctor. We had a mapping and so she is fascinated by that.
I'm proud of her. I heard about a cochlear implant about 10
years ago. My friend Butch who came over to my house and he was one of my classmates from
when I was little. My classmates, from when I was little, we only have five of us in my
class so we were a very tight close family, ok. There were two girls and three boys, so
Butch was one of my classmates. Well, one day he showed up at my door and he goes, “I’ve
got something to show you.” His hair was bald. He had stitches all the way here and
I’m like, “What did you do?” He said, “I got a cochlear implant.” I never heard
of it so at that time I couldn't care less about it. Well, 10 years later I decided that I wasn’t
hearing very well. I use to wear a hearing aid and it was like, you know, it’s not
helping me so why bother getting another hearing aid because it’s not going to work
so that is when I decided to see if I could be a candidate. I went to the doctor he referred
me to my doctor in Chicago, at Washington University and it just went from there. It
took about six months from the day I went until the time I had my surgery,
it took about six months. It’s a learning experience because I have
heard things I have never heard before and what’s funny is one of the first things
I heard was when I farted in the car. I farted so loud that I thought, wow, that was loud!
That’s embarrassing because I’ve been farting all along and I thought nobody could
hear it. But now I have to be really careful because, oh yes, so that was one of my first
things. But I remember when my husband came with me to my mapping and at the time he sounded
like a duck because it’s not perfect, it needed to be fine-tuned but it was kind of
fun because I got to hear things differently like I never heard the dryer go off. I never
heard the microwave button go off. I mean it’s a lot of things that a hearing aid
doesn’t pick up. So like the water fountain. Just the other day I noticed that my dog is
very noisy when he is drinking water. I’m like what is that noise and I realized it
was my dog. I thought, wow, that’s amazing how far I’ve come since.
I’ve had people tell me that I talk better. That I’m more clear. I remember like two
months ago I went to a convention in Rochester and I stopped at the RIT Institute. There
was a hearing department and I remember being a volunteering in this sound proof
room and he wanted to test my voice where how off I was and I felt so good because I
assumed I talked really bad or really loud or whatever. He said, “You speak so well
I’m going to have to kick you out of my class.” So I thought that’s a good feeling.
I graduated from the Governor’s Council in May of 2007. I started the class in October
2006. It was an eight-month class where I had to go to class one weekend a month for
eight months. That was a lot of fun. Because I was a leader in the hearing loss support
group that I had in Indiana somebody thought I could learn something from this policy making
class. They gave me an application, I filled it all out like but you know what if they
pick me I will be honored to take the class. Well I got picked so I took the class. It’s
been very helpful so I could be a better leader for people that live by me.
We all had to do a community project where it has something to do with your disability
or something that you wanted to do. Half the people in my class had a disability and half
of them were a parent of a child with a disability. Because I have a disability, I decided that
because I have a hearing loss, I wanted to do something with hearing loss. I thought
I would do a walk for hearing. I noticed that there were four walks. I mean everybody has
done a breast cancer walk so why not a walk for hearing walk, why not? Chicago never
had one, so I thought, I think Chicago should have one. Well when I say Chicago, it's because
I’m closer to Chicago than Indianapolis. I had to apply, do a proposal to make sure
they would pick me. They picked me. I got to do everything from A to Z. You know, get
a permit, get port-a-potties, get the entertainment, get the electric. I mean it’s not like
you can just show up. It’s not that easy. It’s a lot of work but that was my community
project and I really enjoyed doing it. The walk was October 6 in Lincoln Park and
we had 211 people come and support us. We raised over $64,000.