§ ¶Bang! Twitch?
Was I developing a tic? I started noticing that my left eye was twitching a little too often. I began paying a little more attention and finally realized that it happened when I heard certain frequencies. One night at dinner, Samara banged her spoon on her plate -- on purpose, mind you. *Twitch! Twitch!* My eye exploded. I decided to test my theory. I took my implant off and told her to bang her spoon again. My eye was oblivious. I put my implant back on and prepared myself for the onslaught. Sure enough, my eye went crazy. My theory was officially confirmed.It wasn't just loud noises like the banging of a spoon that made my eye twitch, either. Even just someone talking to me could do it. There was no way to predict. It was very frustrating, not to mention unnerving. I posted on Facebook: "Lisa just realized that her eye twitches when she hears a certain frequency. Time to get a new map!" A couple friends got smart and asked, "What frequency, exactly?" and "Eeeee! Did I hit it?"
I'm not sure when it started, but I suspect soon after my new map. I just didn't make the connection for a while. Sharon squeezed me in during lunchtime today. Figuring out how to get rid of the twitching took trial and error, since the program doesn't allow her to test groups of bands with the High Fidelity 120 program. Doing them individually didn't work either. She eventually figured out that it was mostly bands 11 and 12 - basically I was getting too much electrical stimulation between the bands. The auditory nerve is close to the facial nerve, which explains the twitching. Apparently I'm not the only cochlear implant user experiencing this.
Sharon brought the problematic bands down and kept making certain noises (clapping, banging, saying "bup bup bup") to see if my eye twitched until we got rid of it. Hopefully we accomplished that! My new program (P1) now has new significantly decreased bands of 9-12, while others were increased. My new P2 has slightly increased bands of 7, 8, 12, 14, and 15, which will give me the perception of increased volume. My new P3 has a global increase of two clicks from P2. Sharon feels this new program is more balanced than the map I got last time, which she said was a little out of whack but I seemed to like.
I'm fine with being a bionic woman. I just don't want other people controlling my muscles!!
