Emotional moment deaf woman hears for the first time ever

“Can you hear my voice coming through both sides?”

“Yes, yes.”

A day of significance and emotions come to a head. For 40 years, everything has been silent for Joanne Milne.

“It’s alright. It’s a big, big life-changing day today.”

“Can you hear your own voice?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

“Yes, it will do.”

She’s been deaf since birth, and suffering from Usher Syndrome, which cruelly changed her life again, as it caused her to lose her sight during her twenties.

She was prompted to work for the charity Sense, helping others to cope with the syndrome.

After being fitted with cochlear implants and support from the Midlands Implant Centre, Joanne is now getting used to sounds of her life from people laughing to birds twittering – what many of us may take for granted, all the while building up her own sound library in the brain.

And when it comes to music, she has a good starting point, as the first song she heard was “Imagine” by John Lennon.

“October, November, December.”

“Could you hear those words?”

“Yes, yes I did.”

Difficult words: cope (deal with), cochlear (relating to a part of the inner ear), take for granted (fail to properly appreciate).