CSI: Spike

Currently Reading: Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler

Do you watch CSI? Not the spinoffs, which are pretty good too, but the main CSI, the one from Vegas. Do you watch that? Ever since we got cable I've been watching it a few times a week. I'm not sure what time it's on CBS or what day, but it's always been on opposite something else I watched so I missed most of the episodes when they first aired.

CC and I were watching it last night on Fox and we discovered something rather interesting: the head CSI guy, Gil Grissom, has the same problem with his hearing that I do. You find this out in the last episode of season 2 (I had to look that up). Now, I've seen a few episodes after that when they first ran and characters would remark about him having surgery or if he SHOULD have the surgery. I knew it was about his hearing but I never saw the episode where he was diagnosed so I always wondered if he had the same thing.

Ok, so for those who don't know, Grissom has otosclerosis. Basically it means the bones in your ear harden. Since they can't move, they can't convey vibrations from the ear drum properly and thus you slowly lose your hearing. Fixing it, there aren't many options. You can get by with hearing aids for a while but eventually the bones will get too hard for even that to help. There's a surgery where they actually remove the bones and replace them with graphite. How well it works really depends on the person. For most people you get at least SOME hearing back. Of course, there's also a really good chance that you'll lose it again. The same thing that caused the bones to harden in the first place will go to work on the graphite replacement.

There are risks, naturally. Like any surgery things can go wrong. You always have the risk of infection and since you're dealing with the part of your head that deals with balance, you certainly don't want an infection there. There's also the risk that your head is wired funny so maybe your nerves aren't exactly where they're supposed to be. If the surgeon nicks a nerve you can lose your hearing entirely in that ear. There are also interesting cases where people lose feeling in parts of their face. Not sure what causes that. It's either infection or nicking a nerve.

Pretty interesting isn't it? Me and the main character from CSI have the same problem. Of course, since he's ficitonal, I'm sure HIS surgery was SUCH a success that you'd never notice the difference :-)

It was handled quite well in the show though. Grissom is sitting there consulting with his doctor about it. She tells him the problem and you can see it sink in on his face. Oh I know that look very well. I've tried it on myself. It's the look that tells you that you're going to lose your hearing and there's absolutely nothing you can do to stop it. At best, you can only slow its progress.

-- Somebody hand my wife a tissue please. She's probably about to cry :-) --

I'm going deaf.
I can't stop it.
It's quite depressing.

You know, it's actually a bit of a release typing that out. No tears please, no pity either. I've never been fond of that. I'll be just fine.

Funny how things work out.
It's very comforting to know I'm not alone.
Thank you, everyone, for helping me get through it :-)