My mom has very poor hearing that keeps getting worse. She has many other health problems such as heart failure, mild dementia, and a bad back. Despite these health issues, she LOVES to talk. However, it is very hard to communicate with her because she cannot hear, unless you shout. This is very difficult when we have family over. She wants to be included in conversations and we want her to be included in them, but even when you shout, she still doesn't always hear if it is a group of people. When this happens she gets mad and cries. She thinks that we don't want to talk to her. This is very hard on me. However she will not wear hearing aids. I feel like if she did wear hearing aides, it would be much easier to talk to her and she would be much happier.
If it is vanity that is holding her back you might try pointing out that her deafness emphasises her age much more than hearing aids would.
If so, the problem might be comfort. Mine -- the behind-the-ear kind, with a tiny cone on a clear wire all that goes into the ear -- came with cones that were too big for me, uncomfortable when in and almost impossible to get placed correctly. My audiologist replaced them with cones from a different brand. I wear 'tiniest possible' in one ear and 'only one size bigger than that' in the other.
I also notice a problem with manual dexterity. When my hands are stiff or trembling I have trouble getting them in right, and changing those tiny batteries can be a nightmare.
If they're adjusted too loud - say, because my hand trembled when I tried to adjust with those tiny controls - they're intolerable. The solution to that turned out to be a device I can wear on my belt or around my neck that has bigger buttons.
Hearing aids, no matter how good, can be unbearable in noisy environments.
Conversing with her is exhausting, because everything said to her has to be repeated several times, louder each time. So I tend to say not much at all.
That is a great idea, but unfortunately my mother is most definitely NOT up for that challenge. She has a tracphone, but it is only for emergencies. She can't even really use that.
Women have higher pitched voices and since most of us are the caregivers we seem to have the most difficulty since we are the ones communicating most often. (and lets just face it we talk more anyway)
When we begin to shout the pitch of our voice goes up even more making it even more difficult to understand what we are saying. Not to mention when we get frustrated and begin to shout sometimes we talk faster making it doubly difficult.
So try the lower pitch and slowing the conversation down.
I read once that it may take someone with Dementia 40 seconds to process what was said. I don't know about you but in 40 seconds I am 3 topics ahead. This makes it frustrating for the person with Dementia to follow a conversation, just as they process what was said everyone else is on another topic and that makes the response from the person with dementia sound out of place, like they have no idea what is going on.
Try the lower pitch and slower conversation. Let us know if it works.
As for the hearing aids it may be that they amplify background noise as well making it hard to focus on the conversation
Then, of course, he yelled at me when I made him go to the VA to get hearing aids but then he's been resistant to every suggestion I've ever made so he was being consistent. And this one wasn't negotiable.
He does seem to wear them.
My mother struggled because she lost the coordination to use them, and, she couldn't change the batteries or anything else. My father, courtesy of the VA, has expensive over the ear one's that are easy to set up and use. He also doesn't have dementia so that could be part of it too.
Anyways, make sure she can actually use them. Even mild dementia, and coordination loss can make them hard to use. Maybe a different type would help?
As far as other reasons for resistance, there is no easy answer. My father won't face that he's elderly and won't accept help for the most part. It's his life, he's not in danger, and he gets to make his own decisions. But, damn it's frustrating because there are so many easy changes that could make things easier for him.
Anyways, I don't think I offered much advice so I'll just say good luck with it and it's important.