About

I started this blog up because of many reasons. Let’s start with my background first.

I was born in 1986, and was diagnosed at 8 months old with severe-profound sensorineural hearing loss. My mum was prepared for this eventuality, having earlier gave birth to my brother who was also diagnosed with the same level of hearing loss. I wore hearing aids since then, for close to 12 years.

When I was 12, the cochlear implant technology came to Singapore (my current country of residence). I was implanted, three months after my brother, with the Nucleus cochlear implant. Since then, I have never looked back.

I picked up piano just after being implanted. With an unused piano at home (my mum and sis gave up lessons soon after they started), I started tinkering around with it, taught myself how to play the notes, and persistently bugged my mum and sis to teach me what they knew. Subsequently, my mum started me on piano lessons, and today, I’m a piano player with a Grade 7 ABRSM certificate, well on the way to Grade 8.

My mum is a very strong willed woman who always believed in bringing up her kids to be as normal as anyone could be. She flew to conferences in US and Australia to learn more about cochlear implants and speech therapy. She didn’t like what she saw in the school for the deaf at that time in Singapore, as she felt it had a very poor environment unsuited for learning, and found a mainstream school that would accept us. Since then, we have been mainstreamed all the way. Because of her relentless effort and tireless teaching, I have excelled academically and led a life worth living, uninhibited by my disability.

I have been doing volunteer work with a hospital for quite a while advocating cochlear implants – performing in concerts, speaking at launches, talks, and exhibitions, and interacting with parents, children, adults, pre-implantees and implantees. I have been approached many times to share my experience with a cochlear implant.

This blog is one of my efforts as a cochlear implant advocate to show what an amazing medical device a cochlear implant can be. It will hopefully be another avenue of useful information on the web for all who source for useful information concerning all things related to, but not limited to, cochlear implants.

I will strive to keep this blog up to date on latest advancements in cochlear implant technology.