I found out about the baha via Manchester University Hospital, from the cochlear implant department and I had my operation in March 2007 at Manchester Royal Infirmary.

If I am 100% honest, when I first had the baha switched on there was a feeling of disappointment, which was mainly due to me expecting some sort of miracle and to be able to hear all the things that had been missing for so long. But once the initial disapointment went away and I used the baha in different environments, I began to realise the benefits in being able to understand things more clearly and also discovering in which direction some sounds were coming.

My wife Marie and I have two pubs which are situated in the heart of Trafford Park industrial estate, our trade is made up from local workers, lunchtimes and early evenings and long distance lorry drivers who stay overnight, they come in for a shower and a home cooked meal have a few beers then off to bed in their lorries.

I am very fortunate to have my family around me who very effectively act as my ears. Marie and my father help to deal with the communication as in telephones etc for the business. When I am behind the bar, most of our regular customers know of my deafness and try that little bit harder to help me understand. We are within walking distance of Manchester United football ground so, as you can imagine, both pubs are extremely busy on match days. On these days, I tend to involve myself more in the background work such, as the cellars and the kitchens.

The baha, together with my hearing aids, has added another depth to my hearing (best described as switching on your surround sound on the TV). It doesn’t necessarily increase the sound, but helps me to understand a little better by making some sounds clearer and also makes the sounds more directional, which is good in group conversations

I’m hoping to undergo a second baha operation, which will effectively give me the use of four hearing aids when needed, two baha's and two behind the-ear-aids.

Although my deafness has been deteriorating in recent years, because I communicate so well, most people don’t realise I’m deaf at all, which can create a problem in itself. People tend to think that I’ve heard them, and so make no particular effort to make sure I’ve understood them!

The truth is that I have spent most of my life playing charades inside my head because of my lip reading skills. So long as I have an idea of the topic of conversation, most of the time I only need a couple of words, and can then immediately put into place a sequence which goes something like this......it looks like, it sounded like, so my brain activates and searches for similar looking words visually searching my lipreading dictionary and any other items to help me understand that word or words whilst trying to decipher the rest of the conversation and think of a suitable response. All this takes place in milliseconds and I have noticed that I am becoming more and more reliant on this to help me to understand.

Sometimes it can be quite amusing when I get it wrong but hey we’re only human!