Hearing Matters Podcast: Hearing Aids, Hearing Loss and Tinnitus

When Effortful Listening Ends, Relationships Heal

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The quiet slide from “Huh?” to “I can hear” is rarely a straight line. Jerry—a veteran, entrepreneur, and university instructor—opens up about years of coping with a high-frequency hearing loss that turned restaurants into noise walls and classrooms into cognitive marathons. He tried to compensate: sitting close, reading lips, taking exhaustive notes to plug gaps. The breakthrough came when he moved beyond “good devices” to a best-practice fitting with real-ear measurement that finally matched amplification to his ears and his brain. The difference was instant and visceral: crisp consonants, effortless speech, and the return of details like birdsong that signal a natural listening world.

We walk through the moments that pushed change—the frustration of masked conversations, the chaos of conference chatter, the pressure to catch every student’s question from across a room. You’ll hear why effortful listening drains focus and memory, how industrial noise and military service set the stage for gradual loss, and why many people wait years simply because they don’t know precise solutions exist. We break down the essentials of modern hearing care: annual testing, real-ear verification, careful tuning for sloping losses and dead regions, and ongoing maintenance to keep performance sharp.

The heart of this story is larger than technology. It’s about relationships: a partner who no longer suffers a blaring TV, students who are heard and responded to in real time, and the personal ease that returns when listening stops feeling like work. If you or someone you love is on the fence, Jerry’s advice is simple—don’t hesitate. Get tested, demand verification, and reclaim the clarity that makes conversations, meetings, and family time feel vibrant again. If this resonates, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review to help more people hear their lives fully.

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Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

You're tuned in to the Hearing Matters Podcast, the show that discusses hearing technology, best practices, and a global epidemic. Hearing loss. Before we kick this episode off, a special thank you to our partners. Cycle, built for the entire hearing care practice. Caption call by Sorensen. Life is calling. Care credit. Here today to help more people here tomorrow. Fader Plugs, the world's first custom adjustable earplug. Welcome back to another episode of the Hearing Matters Podcast. I'm founder and host, Blaze Delfino, and as a friendly reminder, this podcast is separate from my work at Starkey. On this episode, we have friend and mentor of mine personally and patient at Audiology Services. His name is Mr. Gerald E. Fault. Jerry, it is a pleasure to have you on the Hearing Matters Podcast.

Gerald Ephault:

Well, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

And it's great to see you. It's been a couple of months since we've seen each other. It's wonderful to finally see you, see how you're doing. Jerry, let's get right into it. You've been a hearing aid user for a little over 10 years. What was the defining moment when you said to yourself, enough is enough. I need to do something about my hearing loss.

Gerald Ephault:

I would characterize the defining moment as becoming self-aware of the multiple experiences I had of not hearing what people were saying to me or sounds from the environment. So it became an awareness. It wasn't any specific activity. It was self-awareness that I was not hearing what I should hear.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Can you explain some of these instances? Because we know that you've been married to Darlene for over 40 years, right? What was life like when you were in a restaurant type setting with Mrs. E. Fault?

Gerald Ephault:

Well, it was difficult. Everything was difficult. In fact, Darlene and I had an agreement that I'd have to look at her directly in the face, not turn sideways. And then I was accountable for what she was telling to me. Because most men will say yes and they don't really know why, what wife said or the significant other or someone else. We all agree and then we get in trouble. But so Darlene and I had the agreement that I would look at her eye to eye, then I'm responsible for what she said, my answer. And that was actually a working agreement until I got my hearing aids. Now I'm accountable for everything. The fact was that it was uncomfortable. In a restaurant, I could not hear because people were closely connected in the same proximity. There was a lot of background sound coming in. I couldn't hear that. And if you were speaking to me, Blaze, like you are now, I'd have difficulty hearing you unless I was right next to you and just attending to you completely.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Jerry, everything that you're telling us right now, we hear on a daily basis from our patients, correct, Dr. Delfino? And what they'll typically say is, my gosh, I would get frustrated. I might begin to socially withdraw. I'm not participating in the conversation. Would you echo that? Would you say that you started to feel those sort of feelings?

Gerald Ephault:

The only feeling I had is that I knew I wasn't hearing the entire conversation, or I wasn't effectively listening. I call it effective listening. Okay. Or I was missing information. It wasn't so much that I was uncomfortable with the individuals with me or the business meetings. I was never uncomfortable in that context. Okay. It was just that I knew there was an impairment occurring and I had to overcome that.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

It's interesting you mentioned listening because we can actually measure, Jerry, effortful listening through what we call pupilometry. And Dr. Delfino, I'd love for you to dovetail and just explain to our listeners right now, number one, why it's so important to visit an audiologist and get your hearing tested on an annual basis. But if you do present with hearing loss, why it feels as though you have to put so much effort to listen and to actually understand what is being said.

Dr. Gregory Delfino:

That connection is oftentimes muddied and oftentimes will create somewhat of a delay. Jerry, in your case, you had mentioned that you were struggling with difficulty hearing. You knew that there was a deficit. What I'm curious to find out, and I ask all of our patients this, is the length of time that it took for you to recognize that the problem was there and then to say I need to do something about it. Not that there was any denial, but there was certainly some procrastination with regard to addressing the issue. And what were some of those barriers that held you back from going out and doing something about this?

Gerald Ephault:

Yeah, I'd say uh procrastination would be uh an appropriate term, not in the sense that you know I was delaying something. Procrastinate means you're delaying a determination or an action. It wasn't that so much, Dr. Delfino. It was more of not being sure of a solution because the hearing loss to me was incremental. My hearing loss started when I was a young man. I was in the military, I do active sport shooting, I had industrial applications, I worked in a manufacturing operation, everything was over 90 decibels. We did not know we were having hearing loss. In fact, it was an accepted outcome of being in the aging process, irrespective of what our occupations were. This was an expected outcome. And I wasn't aware of that a solution could be effective at the same time. So it wasn't so much procrastinating, it was lack of awareness that a solution set was available to me that would actually bring my hearing to what should be normal.

Dr. Gregory Delfino:

And prior to that, had you being in the military, they do uh entrance and then separation exams all during your journey. Were you having your hearing tested? Was it being evaluated? Were you able to see this deterioration of your hearing?

Gerald Ephault:

I became aware of a deterioration of hearing when I was in the industrial sector. I was working in a manufacturing operation. I was there 17 years in that manufacturing operation, which was printing and binding, it was a very high-speed environment. The equipment was operating at very high speeds and was continuous. What we did then when people became aware of hearing loss through OSHA, Occupational Safety and Health Act, people became aware of hearing loss occurring to many people within the industrial or manufacturing sectors. We had audiologist test, and that's when I knew empirically that I was losing my hearing.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Jerry, you're a veteran, and following your time in the service, you entered the private sector and you know had the opportunity to work with startups, small business, big business. Now, during your time working with these companies and business leaders, how did your hearing loss affect your performance?

Gerald Ephault:

It affected me individually because I would accommodate for the knowledge that I wasn't hearing. So I was accommodating, my behavior would accommodate. So I would then make sure I was very close to you. I would sit by you. So I would accommodate my hearing loss to the environment I was in, because I was aware of it, but I was trying to attend to the individual for that effective listening that I spoke of. And then that led to proper communication. But for instance, if I were in a business meeting where we weren't proximate to each other, I would take notes. And then when I came back, I could read my notes and then fill in the gaps. And then take notes at key points. So I was accommodating the situation.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

And what's interesting, all of these compensatory strategies that you were implementing to increase your overall speech understanding, this is all prior to even wearing hearing aids. Correct. And you've lived what it's like to put forth that effortful listening because everything that you just listed there takes time and it takes additional effort. Tell us about in terms of meetings, the seating arrangements. Was there a specific point in time where you got entirely just frustrated, flew up your hands, and said, you know what? Like we said earlier, enough is enough. What was that defining moment? Was there a specific moment where you just got so frustrated, so fed up with having to put forth so much effort that you said, I'm doing something about this?

Gerald Ephault:

Yes, I could say I don't know when the specific moment was, but I know when the specific occurrence was. I'm an instructor, I teach at a university. And in that class environment, that's when it became very apparent because the class environment is different than you would in a business meeting or in your home. Yes. It's very different. In a business meeting, you could usually be in a conference room, uh, you could be in a different situation where you could control the speakers coming to you if you needed to sit closer to someone. You could turn up the volume if it was done through audio, visual presentation. But in a classroom environment, you have students that are arrayed and they have different tonal qualities, volume of their voice, their articulation is different. They may have a dialect that's different than yours. And we had foreign students. So it was very important that I could hear what they were saying so that we could effectively instruct and effectively communicate to each other. That's when I realized that I had to have a solution that was beyond me attending to, I like I spoke earlier within a business meeting. So that classroom environment required that I do something about this.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Dr. Delfino, we talk about these defining moments, and it typically takes seven to ten years for a patient to do something about their hearing loss. What are some defining moments that you've heard just from treating patients for over 30 years?

Dr. Gregory Delfino:

Well, jury is not unique in as much as the realization that what you're hearing and the information that's being imparted to you has an impact not only on you, but on the people around you. The fact that what people are saying, expressing their sentiments, their thoughts, has an influence on what you do and how you respond, and it elevates your ability to hear and understand to a point where you want the best performance that you can get, the best mode of communication that you can present so that you don't feel as though you are diminishing their experience as well as yours.

Gerald Ephault:

Well, Dr. Topino, I could give you a specific example of where a combination was where instructors were using whiteboards. So if I turn my back in a highly interactive class where you're soliciting the students to respond to you, or what are you putting on the whiteboard? If you turn your back and you have a hearing difficulty that I did, that's a problem. So how do you adjust to that?

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Jerry, you're a very good friend of the families and personal mentor of mine. And you were one of the first mentors that I personally had when we started the Fader Plugs journey. And while working with you, we always discussed hearing health care, hearing aids. And almost two years ago, I personally had the opportunity to fit you with your new hearing technology. And we're curious to know, tell us what your experience has been like with your new hearing aids.

Gerald Ephault:

First of all, I could say, and he put this in paraphrase, I can hear with that exclamation point. Well, in your brain, it says, I can hear. It's a revelation. That's what the way I want to say it. Very emphatically, it's a revelation. Like I can hear, because you couldn't hear before. I had another set of hearing aids from a different company, and they were state-of-the-art, really good hearing aids, but yet the units that you fit me with were exceptional. And then also your capability to adjust them to my hearing, to my brain, made the world of difference. So, first of all, I could hear just that you placing them in them, but then the adjustments that you made here at the service really brought it to my brain and enhanced the hearing by orders of magnitude. It was very different, a very different experience for me.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

And it's so important because we know that you are a professor. You currently work at Wilkes University and you were an adjunct professor at East Trousburg University in the Innovation Center. So you're cultivating the young minds of tomorrow's future, right? And that was so important for us to understand that. What is the problem that you're trying to solve? What are some of the situations and environments that you personally need to understand in? What did you notice once we fit you with your technology in the classroom? Because the classroom is often difficult. You're talking to maybe multiple students at the same time. They're asking questions at a distance. What has this new experience been like for you?

Gerald Ephault:

Well, it it really brought to me how I should hear if I were a normal and didn't have any disease within my ear canals, you know, the problem of hearing loss. That normalcy allows me then to teach effectively. And for students and I to communicate effectively. So it's a big difference. But I want to point out, too, that in the home environment or what your family are not in the classroom, this is just as important so that I can hear effectively. I mentioned my wife, Darlene, earlier. She was long-suffering. You don't realize how long suffering your partner is or your family by you not being able to hear. It really is. And that's quite dramatic. And there's a re accountability and responsibility on the individual to overcome that. That's how I look at things. And my other hearing aids I had weren't that effective in accomplishing what I wanted to. If you're watching TV, I had to get my own hearing devices so I could have it remote going into my earphones and what have you. Yep. So I was buying devices like that, so that the audio on a television, if my wife and I were watching a show together, I wouldn't have it at some volume level that was like almost like someone screaming to her. Whereas to me, I was just about effectively just getting the words or the sound of a musical instrument and what have you. So that I want to point out was just as important to me, not only in the classroom environment where you have multiple individuals, spatial distance, a lot of things happening at once, multiple people speaking at one time. Whereas in the family, you really want to attend to people. But you're also, like I said, I use the word long suffering because you realize just the difference of where it is. And even now, when I take my hearing aids out at night, I could tell immediately the sound decibel level coming into my head.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

It's like a blanket's being put over your head.

Gerald Ephault:

Yeah, it's crazy. It just drops down so much. You could just tell when it's happening. It's not subtle.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Dr. Delfino, Jerry presents with a sloping high frequency hearing loss and essentially no response at six and eight thousand hertz bilaterally in both right and left ear. So we knew that there were some essentially dead regions in the cochlea. And when we fit Jerry with his hearing instruments and we conducted real ear measurement, do you remember Jerry saying, wow, it sounds so clear. Why is it so important when you are fitting hearing technology to conduct real ear measurement and take all of the data into consideration when fitting the hearing aid properly, utilizing real ear measurement?

Dr. Gregory Delfino:

You know, it's interesting, Jerry, in your case, when we would have conversations with you and you would tell us you were wearing instruments and that you were struggling with hearing speakers, and you had in in some sense had addressed the issue by putting on hearing aids and hearing aids you thought were of good quality, but you were still struggling with many issues that had been with you for a number of years. Blaze and I, when we were talking about that, we had a sense that there was something more that could be done. You know, the reality is that anyone who is working with people with hearing loss, and anyone who is trying to ameliorate those issues, our goal must be to represent hearing to that ear canal in its most natural and normal form. There's where we're talking about restorative hearing. We're bringing it back to a level of normal. And having looked at your audiogram, Blaze and I knew we could do more, but the issue was then how do we precisely tune in your instruments to your loss? And that's why using pro-microphone, real ear measure, we were able to do exactly that. And that's why you had such an aha moment, because these instruments were now creating a listening environment that was most natural to what you were expecting.

Gerald Ephault:

Yes, that's uh absolutely true. I mean, I that aha moment, if you want to characterize it like that, that was essentially what happened. Another thing that I noticed also, and Blaze, you asked me about uh the finding moment when it happened. I still recall when you were speaking out, Dr. Defino, at I was at a conference and there was hundreds of people there. And I recall speaking to people, but there were people all around. They were we were crowded together. It was pre-COVID. We're all crowded together, and multiple conversations were going on, not in the same party, people, you know, a foot away from you with their backs talking to three other people. And what I realized that I was getting so much sound carryover that I couldn't discern what the person in front of me was saying, even though I was proximate to that individual and looking right at them, I could not overcome all that sound that was coming into me through the background noise, all kind of background noise. That was one of those moments that came to my mind.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Tell us what your experience has been like now in those complex listening situations. I know with COVID it's a little different because there's not a lot of crowds, but when we fit you with this new technology, there had to have been quite a noticeable difference when you are in those maybe complex listening situations with multiple speakers because you're very active and at conferences.

Gerald Ephault:

Yes. Well, actually, I don't really discern a problem. Let me start there. I don't discern a problem. And when you mentioned the COVID, well, I use the K95 and N95 masks, right, all the time. And our students are required, for instance, to wear masks. Wilkes University has an excellent policy of, if you would, not having people get COVID. Ensuring the health and safety of their students. Yeah, it's avoidance of the problem. Like, let's avoid it. So they have a very strict policy, which I approve of and I think they're doing a great job. And we can see it in the results. But we're all wearing masks and we're separated, right? So we're speaking now, and people are speaking to me through masks. And we have it within our center, everyone's wearing a mask. So we all are wearing masks here in this conversation now. So think about that. That would have been a stop point because your voice would have came in muffled to me. Very much so. Very much so, right? And when I met your receptionist, it would have been muffled. Yes. So just that environment and now this COVID, which is exacerbating everything. We know that. We understand. But you're using a filter, if you would, between the communicators. I haven't discerned an issue with it. Oh, that's to have the new heroes. That's phenomenal. Yeah.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

And Dr. Delfino, what we've found is that especially wearing the masks, Jerry, we've had a lot of patients come in and say, I can't quite understand what's being said. And we feel as though the introduction of the masks has sort of brought to light how important our sense of hearing is because now you can't depend on lip reading.

Dr. Gregory Delfino:

We've essentially turned down the volume on every individual that is speaking. But not only that, we've eliminated any of the visual cues that we use. People with hearing impairments and even folks with non-hearing impairments use visual cues to fill in those pieces that they're missing. Looking at facial grimaces or gestures are all part of the communication process. So we've essentially not only turned down the volume, but we've eliminated that as part of our parlay, if you will, with conversation.

Gerald Ephault:

Yes, Dr. Fear. I actually use the mask as an analog to hearing loss. It's an analog to hearing loss. It really represents what someone goes through that has a hearing loss. So I could phrase it that way.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

Jerry, you are a veteran, which again, on behalf of the Hearing Matters Podcast, Audiology Services, and Fader Plugs, thank you for your service. Truly, thank you, thank you, thank you. So you're a veteran, family man, professor, entrepreneur, and outdoorsman. What don't you do? But how has the hearing technology positively influenced your interpersonal relationships?

Gerald Ephault:

It really has improved everything across the spectrum, please, everywhere across the spectrum. That's the only way I could define this. It's just changed my behavior of accommodation to a sense of normalcy, dealing with people. I don't have to worry about if I'm sitting back from a speaker at a conference. I don't have to really turn up the volume on our audio equipment. Don't have to do that. In class, it's very effective and listening and hearing what people are saying. And then in the personal life, in your family life, we don't have that difficulty now where my wife hears at one level and she has very good hearing. And she'll say, Do you hear those birds outside? And normally, if I don't have my hearing aids, I cannot hear that. And then I have tinnitus, which exacerbates the whole problem. So by having the hearing aids in, it overcomes the tinnitus and allows me to live in a normal environment. And that's probably the best of all. Like you're living a normal environment. So if you're speaking on the phone, you could hear someone in your home and you're listening to music, you don't have to jack up the volume, and then the other person is in distress because it's so loud. Absolutely. Right. So that whole sense of normalcy is so important. That need not to accommodate is so important. Because you go in, I'm confident all the time, but you know from effective listening that you actually are going to be able to communicate.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

And again, just for our listeners, the goal of wearing a hearing instrument is to decrease overall listening effort and to increase overall speech understanding. That is why we fit our patients with hearing technology. Jerry, I would consider you and we would consider you an early adopter. You are absolutely an early adopter. What would you tell patients who are on the fence with regard to moving forward with hearing technology? They know that they present with the hearing loss, but there's some apprehension there. What would you tell those individuals?

Gerald Ephault:

Well, not to hesitate. I would tell them to come here to audiology services, and that's not a plug. It's just based on my experience here and the quality of service, the attention to me as an individual. And also the technology that's fitted in the Audicon. I have the Audicon system. That technology is the enhancing part. So we have professionalism. That's my view of this service here at Audiologist Services. The care of you and Dr. Delfino to me as a patient. Very important. That relationship. Dr. Delfino, you mentioned before how you were attending to my requirements, how I heard, what would be normal to me. Those are very important from a patient doctor provider relationship. And then also the technology that you have here is important. You just used my hearing aids and took out the moisture. And I didn't realize there was any moisture in my hearing aids. I take very good care of them. But there was moisture in there, and you told me how many decibels it was reducing my hearing. Yes. So I would say to everyone in your audience, do not hesitate. Come in, be tested. You'll find out what could improve your life.

Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS:

You're tuned into the Hearing Matters podcast with Dr. Gregory Delfino, M. Blaze Delfino of Audiology Services and Fader Plugs. Today we had Gerald E. Fault join us. He is a veteran, entrepreneur, businessman, professor, and current hearing aid user, and he shared his experience, his amazing experience with his hearing technology. For more information, visit HearingMattersPodcast.com. Until next time, hear life story.

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Blaise M. Delfino, M.S. - HIS

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