You only hear when you want to When I was a child, my parents were often angry with me for not reacting when they, for example, asked me to come and help them wash the dishes.

It often turned into quite a drama as they accused me of not wanting to help. I got angry, but also sad. It was frustrating that they did not believe that I had not heard what they said to me.

They often just said: ‘There is nothing wrong with your hearing when we rustle a bag of sweets. You only hear when you want to’. Well, I don’t blame them now, because they did not, at that time, realise that I had a rather large degree of hearing loss.