Time for Gun Law Reform

Wisconsin Wants Common Sense Gun Law Reform
Let the Legislature Debate New Laws

In the wake of yet more mass shootings this week that left far too many dead and injured, Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers asked Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos to meet and discuss how to address the growing problem of gun violence. There have been over 250 mass shootings this year alone where 4 or more died, with two occurring in Wisconsin.

After agreeing to meet, Vos immediately tweeted that he would not consider gun law reform and blamed the recent carnage on “mental illness.” Fitzgerald indicated that he would not consider any bills that infringed on the 2nd Amendment and Due Process. Their entrenched views will certainly preclude legislative consideration of universal background checks for all firearm purchases or of “red flag” laws that would permit a judge to order firearm confiscation from those found to be a serious threat to themselves or others. 

These modest proposals are already finding renewed favor in states historically opposed to gun law reforms such as Ohio where the republican governor called for similar measures in light of the killing sprees in Dayton and El Paso.

Blaming “mental illness” for our gun violence problem is a distraction dreamed up by the NRA and pedaled by those afraid of losing NRA support. According to U.S. Senator Chris Murphy, 19 out of twenty murderers and 4 out of 5 mass shooters do not have mental illness diagnoses. All of the civilized countries in the world have citizens with mental illness, yet none come close to having as many gun homicides or mass shootings as we do, except those at war. Trump’s recent blaming of the mentally ill for the latest round of killings is all the more bizarre when we recall that one of his first presidential acts was to reverse the Obama era rule barring firearm sales to the mentally ill. 

Hatred of others not like the shooter based on religion, race or country of origin is not a “mental illness.” Hatred and fear of others are among the hallmarks of the white supremacist nationalists all too often found with their fingers on the trigger of the assault-style weapons that kill our fellow citizens. 

The current batch of white supremacist nationalist killers have often been self-described Trump supporters who appear to have been given permission to repel the “invaders” and wipe out the “infestations” their leader describes at his rallies and in his tweets. Trump’s refusal to consider basic gun reform measures further emboldens the haters to continue their killings. His recent condemnation of white supremacy and hatred ring hollow when followed by his tweets attacking his critics in racist and hate filled terms.

Other GOP notables trot out obsession with violent video games as a leading cause of our mass shooting carnage. Other countries, notably China and Japan, have far more video gamers that we do, yet far fewer mass shootings or murders by firearm. No other country where video gamers play violent games comes close to approaching our levels of gun violence. 

What all of our mass shooters have in common is all too easy access to the assault style rifles with high capacity magazines and ammunition designed to inflict the greatest amount of damage to human bodies. Lack of access to these weapons of mass destruction is one of the hallmarks of those countries with almost no mass shootings. 

The tide of public opinion on gun control has shifted. Over 80 percent of Wisconsin citizens in a recent Marquette University Law School poll supported universal background checks for all firearm purchases. This would eliminate the so-called “gun show” loophole in present law that exempts private firearm sales from current background check rules. Over half of those polled also supported a ban on assault-style rifles.

Twenty-two states now have “red flag” laws similar to those now proposed by Wisconsin Attorney General Josh Kaul. These laws provide due process protections for gun owners by requiring a hearing before a judge where evidence of current danger to self or others must be presented before firearms can be removed by law enforcement. Such measures will certainly pass constitutional muster under the 2nd Amendment.

While important first steps, these measures will not address the need to further restrict access to the weapons whose sole purpose is to kill human beings. Until we renew the assault weapons ban, the killings will continue unabated. 

Speaker Vos and Majority Leader Fitzgerald would do well to take a step back from the NRA talking points and mythology and allow the legislature to freely debate how best protect all Wisconsin citizens from further gun violence. Let us urge them to act on reasonable gun reform before there is another Wisconsin mass shooting. We deserve no less.

Death Penalty Is Wrong

The Death Penalty is Wrong
Wisconsin rejects Capital Punishment

The U. S. Department of Justice just announced that it would start executing people convicted of federal capital offenses in December. President Trump’s apologist Attorney General, William Barr, announced that the first five inmates will die within six weeks. How a staunchly pro-life administration justifies state sponsored killing, while opposing abortion on demand, continues to baffle me. 

The Federal government restored using capital punishment in 1988 and only executed three inmates up to 2003, when it was again suspended. Thirty-seven Federal inmates were executed from 1927 to 2003. In 2014, President Obama ordered a review of death penalty procedures because of concerns over botched executions performed with lethal injections. The current administration announced that the lethal injection concerns have been resolved, clearing the way to start the killings once again. 

Here in Wisconsin, the death penalty was abolished at the end of the 19th century. There was an effort to reinstitute it in the middle 1990s when republicans controlled the legislature and held the governor’s office. 

I had the privilege to be the Chair of the Wisconsin State Bar’s Criminal Law Section from 1994-97. That section is made up of prosecutors, defense lawyers and judges involved with Wisconsin’s criminal justice system.

Our Section looked at the legislative proposal to re-introduce capital punishment and concluded that capital punishment was flawed on a number of levels. We were concerned about the possibility of executing an innocent person. At that time, DNA testing was offering some increased certainty, but many cases lack DNA evidence to test. Research into false confessions and the vagaries of eyewitness identification also lent support to our opposition to the penalty. We all knew that the criminal justice system cannot get it right all of the time and that it is wrong to convict and kill innocent people. 

We also looked at the impact of capital prosecutions on the rest of the justice system. Capital cases cost several times more than other cases that go to trial. Expert testimony, pre-trial litigation and appeals add to the costs and the time cases take to conclusion, taking resources away from other areas of the justice system. Court time for capital cases would take time away from civil cases and would grind the rest of the court system to a halt, especially in smaller counties.

The issues we identified in the 1990s are still present today. They are magnified at the federal level where now Federal courts can impose the death penalty for a federal crime committed in a state that does not have the death penalty. 

President Trump ran his campaign on a “pro-life” platform, promising to appoint “pro-life” judges to the Federal courts. If you believe “life begins at conception” and “all lives matter,” how can you support state sanctioned killing?

I worked with many prosecutors in state and federal courts over the years of my work as a defense lawyer. Former Milwaukee County District Attorney, E. Michael McCann, was among the best and most thoughtful prosecutors I ever tried cases against. McCann, a devout Catholic, was a staunch opponent of the death penalty throughout his tenure and was a strong voice in the debate over its reintroduction. His faith drove his belief that state sanctioned killing was wrong morally. He also understood how trying death cases would take limited resources away from other important law enforcement prosecutions. 

Our work, coupled with the advocacy of other anti-death penalty groups, convinced the Wisconsin legislature not to pursue reintroduction of the death penalty. The proposals died in committee without ever coming to a full vote in either chamber of the legislature. Subsequent efforts to pursue capital punishment also withered and stopped all together by 2000.

Only 22 states now allow capital punishment. Most are republican controlled. How states without the death penalty will react to federal courts sentencing their citizens to death when their state courts cannot will create an interesting political dynamic. 

All of the legalities and moral considerations aside, I still fail to understand how those professing to be “pro-life” can support an administration that engages in state sponsored killing of its own citizens, especially when we have life means life sentencing laws for the most serious offenses.

Attorney General Barr has injected an issue into our political debate that will further divide the electorate and give Trump’s opponents another point of discussion in upcoming election cycles. It is time we abolished the death penalty as many other civilized countries have done.

Obamacare Unconstitutional?

Be Careful What You Wish For

Litigation often brings unintended consequences

Republicans have long railed against the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. Salivating at the chance to be rid of the epitome of socialist government run amok, 22 Attorneys General from republican led states brought suit in Federal Court to have the entire act declared unconstitutional. They most recently pressed their case before a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in the deep south. Two of the three judges favorably received the GOP arguments, foreshadowing a favorable decision. Whichever way the appeals court judges rule, the loser will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to take the case. Standing in the way are five of the nine justices who voted to uphold the law in 2012.

Should Obamacare be declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, several of its very popular provisions will cease to be in force immediately. Among those would be protection for those 133 million Americans with pre-existing conditions that currently prohibits insurance companies from denying coverage for those maladies. We recall vividly the recent lame-duck session of our own legislature that failed to pass state protection for pre-existing conditions proposed just in case the Obamacare litigation gutted them. 

There are a number of other Obamacare provisions that would be eliminated immediately with a decision that the whole law fails to pass constitutional muster. A recent survey of the law in the New York Times outlines what is at risk.

Obamacare also provides a number of other protections for health insurance consumers including elimination of the caps on the lifetime amounts that could be paid under a policy, elimination of caps on the amount insurers can require for deductibles, prohibitions against charging older customers more than younger ones and prohibitions on dropping more expensive benefits like prescription medication coverages. All would vanish if Obamacare is declared void.

Obamacare provided permanent authorization of the Indian Health Service that provides doctors and hospitals to more that two million Native Americans. 

Obamacare enabled the Food and Drug Administration to consider and approve biosimilar medications. They are like generic versions of biologic medications which cannot be copied as easily as typical drugs. So far twenty-one biosimilar medications have been approved by the FDA. Elimination of Obamacare could jeopardize those approvals and discourage new biologics from coming to market. 

Obamacare created a new office to innovate new methods of paying for healthcare services, such as lump sum payments for hip replacements and courses to lower diabetes risk. Even the Trump administration seized on this one, using it to link Medicare payments for certain drugs to prices from an international index thus lowering costs. Ending Obamacare would eliminate these efforts as well. 

Obamacare changed several Medicare payment formulas, reducing amounts paid to hospitals. Healthcare providers adjusted their practices to accommodate these changes and undoing them would be difficult. The changes extended the life of the Medicare Hospital Trust Fund and their loss would cause Medicare to lose several years of solvency. 

Obamacare requires drug companies to disclose gifts and payments to physicians, exposing bias in prescribing practices. The end of Obamacare eliminates this safeguard. 

Obamacare reduced the “doughnut hole” in Medicare drug plans that enabled the plans to stop paying for seniors’ meds once they reached a certain amount. Eliminating Obamacare makes seniors on fixed incomes liable for much more of the costs for their medications. 

Obamacare included benefits for breastfeeding mothers like insurance coverage for breast pumps and a requirement that employers provide private spaces for mother to express milk. Thousands of employers that have changed policies to accommodate breastfeeding employees could drop these benefits should Obamacare be invalidated. 

Let’s not forget the 21 million Americans who would lose all healthcare coverage if Obamacare is invalidated. 

If recent history is any guide, our GOP dominated legislature could not even pass legislation to protect those with pre-existing conditions. How can we expect it to provide Obamacare protections for these other benefits current law provides?

To top it off, a declaration that Obamacare is unconstitutional will pave the way for passage of “Medicare for All” on the national level. A measure that already commands support from a solid majority of the American voting public.

Be careful what you wish for, very careful.

Leave our Constitution Alone

Leave our Constitution Alone
It works just fine

When our founding fathers sat down to write our new nation’s Constitution and Bill of Rights, they recognized that we needed protections against governmental abuses that deprived citizens of their freedom. With abuses by the English crown in mind, they crafted bedrock principles to protect us against future governments run amok. 

When the government accuses a citizen of a crime, the citizen starts the process with the presumption of innocence. This requires the government to carry the burden of proving that a crime was committed and that the citizen accused committed it. The accused never has to prove her innocence. 

The second principle requires the government to prove the guilt of the accused beyond a reasonable doubt. This is the highest evidentiary standard used in the law and is meant to ensure a high degree of certainty in the verdict.

The third principle requires the accused be afforded due process of law. This means the government has to tell the accused what crime has been charged, what evidence it intends to use to prove it and provide a neutral forum to hear that evidence.

Finally, the accused is guaranteed that her case will be tried before a jury of her peers who have to unanimously agree as to her guilt or innocence. 

These protections are buttressed by additional requirements preventing governmental invasions of privacy. Before the government can invade your home looking for evidence, it must first obtain a warrant from a judge based upon a credible showing that evidence of a crime is probably located in the place to be searched. 

These protections against government over-reach have worked well since our nation was founded. They apply to all and can be invoked by anyone who stands accused. 

Because those who commit criminal offenses are not well regarded, some in our legislatures seek to curry favor with those who would dispense with these protections for the “obviously guilty” by “getting tough on crime.” One such effort led to the passage of a victim’s rights amendment to our Wisconsin Constitution.  It provided “victims” with a set of rights to make sure that they are treated fairly by the criminal justice system. It set up an obvious conflict with the rights afforded to the criminally accused that is still being litigated in criminal cases. 

Not to be out done in stripping rights from the accused, our legislature has recently passed a new set of “victims’ rights,” known as “Marsy’s Law.” Because the proposed provisions change the state constitution, they must be approved by the voters in a statewide referendum this fall. 

The Wisconsin Justice Institute (WJI) recently published an analysis of “Marsy’s Law” authored by noted criminal defense lawyer, Dean Strang.

Strang looked at all 16 provisions of the new law and noted that voters must consider all in an up or down vote, not 16 separate votes. He concludes that while some of the provisions are laudable and workable, some unconstitutionally invade the rights given to the accused and place undue burdens upon law enforcement officers and district attorneys seeking to comply.

While people can be and are harmed by the acts of others, they do not become “victims” in the criminal law sense until the person who caused the harm is convicted by a jury of his peers who unanimously agreed that the government proved his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. “Marsy’s Law” continues the effort to put a finding that one is a “victim” before the accused is tried and convicted.

Here are some of the problem areas identified in the WJI analysis titled “Marsy’s Flaws.”

One provides a “victim” with a right to privacy. This directly invades the accused’s right to notice of the charges against him, the identity of his accusers and the evidence that will be presented by the government in its effort to convict. This new “right” will create a false sense of hope and expectations for those harmed. 

Another right is to have the proceedings be “free from unreasonable delay.” The proposed law does not tell us who gets to decide if a delay is unreasonable, nor does it fashion a remedy. Would a delayed trial mean that charges are dismissed or that the accused must be found guilty without a trial? The first would not please the “victim” and the second would not pass constitutional muster. 

A third provision allows the “victim” to attend all court proceedings upon request. This will not work as written. It would require the state to provide notice and transportation to all “victims” wanting to attend but unable to afford to and that judges schedule proceedings so that their attendance can happen. For a working, out of state “victim,” this would mean court hearings at night or on weekends to accommodate schedules. 

A fourth requires “victim” access to the attorney for the government upon request. Most district attorney offices have victim-witness coordinators who serve as points of contact with prosecutors. Most DAs do not have the time to meet with “victims” whenever they ask. Again, this provision creates false hopes and is unworkable given current staffing levels. 

A fifth requires that a “victim” be allowed to address the court in any proceeding where one of her rights is implicated. This will create chaos in the courtroom as “victims” often disagree with decisions made by prosecutors and sometimes even ask that charges be dismissed or reduced. 

Finally, Marsy’s law provides that “victims” are entitled to “full” restitution from the person ordered to pay it. What happens when the offender cannot pay due to incarceration or death? This provision would then require state taxpayers to foot the bill. 

“Marsy’s Law” is not needed to address a real problem. Its passage is meant to appease the “tough on crime” crowd that has led us to be one of the countries with the largest prison population on the planet. Our constitution was written to protect us all from government over-reach. Let’s keep it that way.

Death is Inevitable

Death is Inevitable
Tell me how to help

We all have one thing in common. Sooner or later we are all going to die. Most do not have the luxury of knowing when or what will end our lives. Way too many think death is just for the old and infirm and is personally way too far off to contemplate. Far too few plan for end of life issues, leaving family with hard choices.

Death that comes quickly is somehow easier. Those with long, slow death dealing infirmities put caregivers, loved ones and medical providers in tough ethical and moral conundrums. Do we treat aggressively, moderately, passively or not at all? Who gets to make the decisions for the incapacitated who can no longer make decisions on their own? What happens when medical judgments and religious beliefs clash? What happens when family members disagree about the course of treatment?

As a guardian for those with dementia or other incapacitating infirmities, I have experienced first-hand what happens when death comes before affairs are put in order and end of life wishes are made known. 

People who fail to plan for their eventual death or terminal illness exist in what is known as “full code” status. That means that first responders and medical providers must use all means necessary to keep the person alive unless certain guidelines are followed. This can result in invasive medical procedures that may compromise quality of life or cause pain to the patient. 

People who are competent can direct how they want to be treated when they are not able to direct how and what medical treatments are undertaken for them. This is usually accomplished by creating a written living will that outlines what steps can and cannot be taken. People can also designate through a written Health Care Power of Attorney who can make medical and end of life decisions for them if they become incapacitated. Hospitals have forms you can fill out and elder care and estate planning lawyers can also help. Taking the time to create these plans and then discussing them with your family and loved ones will save them and you from the chaos that can follow sudden life-threatening injury and illness. 

For those who courts have determined to be incompetent and fall under the care of a guardian, end of life decision making gets complicated. If the person has made their wishes known before becoming incompetent, guardians can honor those wishes as life winds down. 

One of the major issues is whether to administer cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) if a person suffers cardiac or respiratory arrest. If a person does not want to have this intervention, she can sign a “Do Not Resuscitate” (DNR) order and provide copies to their medical providers and hospitals, keeping copies at home and in vehicles for first-responders. We know from studies that CPR when performed on elderly patients in nursing or other residential care can cause pain and broken ribs. We also know that long term recovery in these patients is not significantly improved if CPR is administered. 

If no DNR order is in place, guardians can obtain one under certain conditions. First, the person must be 18 or older (known to be not pregnant) and have a terminal condition or a medical condition that could make such actions unsuccessful or repeated cardiac or respiratory failure would occur before death, or have a condition where resuscitation would cause significant physical pain or harm that outweighs the possibility of restored function for an indefinite period of time. Next, an attending physician has to provide written information on procedures that might be used and how the patient can revoke the DNR consent. A DNR form is then signed by the doctor and guardian.

DNR orders do not address the withholding or withdrawal of life-sustaining medical treatment from someone who is unable to make those decisions. Again, living wills and Healthcare Powers of Attorney can spell out your wishes before these decisions have to be made. Those without this advance planning, put guardians and loved ones called upon to consider them at a considerable disadvantage.

In order for a guardian to withhold or terminate life-sustaining treatment like hydration and artificial nutrition, three physicians have to determine the person to be in a “persistent vegetative state.” If the person expressed their wishes on the subject, the guardian must follow those wishes. If not, the guardian must determine if the proposed course is in the person’s “best interest.” Courts have held that continued life is in a person’s “best interest.”

In considering if treatment withdrawal is in the person’s “best interest,” guardians must consider what treatments will do to the person, life expectancy and prognosis for recovery with or without treatments, the various treatment options, the risks, benefits and side effects of each treatment and the opinions of those who have known the person for significant periods of time. If these considerations weigh in favor of withholding or ending treatment, then the guardian must notify all “interested parties” and give them time to respond. If no one objects, the guardian can withhold or end treatment. If there is an objection, the matter is brought before the probate court for decision.

These are complicated and difficult issues fraught with emotional overlays making it more than worth the effort to address them long before they get presented. Please have the conversations needed to make your wishes known to your spouse, children and extended family. Make your own decisions now about how you want to be treated in the event you cannot express your wishes. It will make it easier on those called upon to help you as your life ends.

Read My Lips

Read My Lips
GOP Tax policy only helps the rich

Here’s a surprise. The 2017 Trump tax cuts that were supposed to stimulate economic growth and trickle down to working people through higher wages have not come close to achieving those lofty selling point goals. Instead, People who own businesses and other concentrated wealth will have a lot more money to hoard and the federal budget will have significantly less to spend.

The Congressional Research Service, an in-house, non-partisan fact finding body, just published a paper outlining the effects of the 2017 Tax Revision, often called the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, and the GOP members in Congress cannot be happy. It finds that none of these secondary effects have shown up and are not likely to in the long run. Growth has not increased above levels before the tax cuts went into effect. Wages have not increased either. There was a short and small bump in repatriated corporate cash from abroad, but that has leveled off. The expected business investment from the tax cut windfall failed to materialize. 

Many of the GOP tax cuts supporters claimed, without any support from recognized economists, that anticipated business growth would pay for the loss of revenue to the treasury and certainly not increase the deficit. The report shows that, so far, growth has made up about 5 percent of the lost revenue, missing the projections by a mere 95 percent. 

Cut supporters helped sell the plan by promoting increased worker wages from the excess corporate cash provided by the cuts. Unfortunately, the report finds no widespread increases in bonuses or wages. It does show significant stock buy-backs and repatriated dividends from subsidiaries abroad helping businesses increase their cash holdings. 

I doubt that many of those who supported the cuts will back away from them in light of the new data. Their corporate donors are happy and that’s where they get most of their economic support. More rational constituent centered lawmakers might use the report to marshal support for repealing the cuts and then using the trillions in lost revenue to build more realistic growth and worker supporting policies.

Here in Wisconsin, the GOP controlled purse strings continue to tighten, stunting growth potential with proven successes. Our leaders do not want to be outdone by their federal counterparts.

Members of the GOP controlled legislative Joint Finance Committee continued their evisceration of Governor Evers’ Peoples Budget on Tuesday. Evers proposed spending $130 million more on the UW System over the next two years. The GOP Committee approved just $58 million more, with $45 million being subject to committee approval of a report showing how the money would be spent. 

UW System President Ray Cross opined that these decisions missed an opportunity to meet the future needs of the state and felt “like a kick in the shins.” Cross indicated that the approved amount will prevent the UW from expanding high demand nursing and engineering programs on many campuses. They will also limit the System’s ability to hire and retain quality educators.

While the Committee agreed with Evers to continue the UW tuition freeze, it failed to approve state funding for the revenue lost from the freeze. Fully funding the freeze would have helped the UW System catch-up from all the previous funding cuts under the Walker dynasty.

The educations provided by our UW System have fueled state economic growth for decades. As a proud Alum, I recognize that my professional success and contributions to Wisconsin’s economy over 37 years of lawyering would not have been possible without the support and funding provided to me as both an undergrad and law student on the Madison campus in the 1970s.

Failing to adequately fund the UW System under the guise of accountability and political correctness, cuts off our economic nose to spite our collective faces. 

The Joint Finance Committee previously voted not to expand Wisconsin participation in Medicaid, a federal program that helps cover the cost of healthcare for the indigent. Even though data from other states that have received Medicaid expansion funds shows significant taxpayer savings for healthcare costs for the uninsured or underinsured, our legislators continue to believe that someday, maybe or possibly, the federal government will change its mind and force state taxpayers to continue to cover these costs. Under this rational, thousands of poor people will go without necessary healthcare that could return them to productive citizenry, the state’s share of the current costs will continue to rise anyway and our economy will continue to suffer. 

These shortsighted, no tax increase decisions doom opportunities for working- and middle-class people to prosper and succeed like my generation was able to do. The better educated we are, the more we earn. The more we earn with our labor, the more Wisconsin prospers. 

Hearing Loss

Hearing loss is a Family Affair

Communication is difficult

Living with a disability requires a lot of help. My ability to hear has been steadily declining for almost 20 years. It was probably caused by the loud rock music of my youth and the years I worked as a union stagehand for rock concerts in the 1970s before hearing protection was required. 

I started wearing basic analog hearing aids in 2005. I graduated to more powerful digital hearing aids in 2010. My hearing loss eventually made work as a trial lawyer impossible by late 2012. Trial work requires being able to hear everything that goes on in the courtroom. I retired from my law practice in 2013. 

My wife and kids have suffered from my hearing loss almost as much as I have. It makes every day conversation much more difficult. We now often have to rely upon a small microphone my wife can wear that connects directly to my hearing aids for me to hear and understand what she has to say, especially in the car or other noisy environments.

My ability to make out spoken words has decreased to the point where ordinary speech is all but unintelligible without my hearing aids.  Even with their assistance, I still need to see a speaker’s mouth and have context to fully understand a conversation. 

 I cannot use a regular telephone handset, but I can listen to my cell phone thanks to a Bluetooth connection between my iPhone and hearing aids. The same goes for television. We use both closed captioning and a Bluetooth audio connection to my aids. Even with the enhancements, I miss about 20 percent of the dialog. Because my loss is more profound in the higher frequencies, music has lost much value for me. I still listen to music from my younger years, filling in the high notes and lyrics from memory rather than hearing them anew.

It is almost impossible for me to carry on a conversation in noisy environments like restaurants, in the car while driving or in a group where more than one person is talking at the same time. Speech in large rooms, like courtrooms and meeting rooms is very difficult to understand.

Over the years, we have developed several rules for communicating that will be helpful for anyone with moderate to severe hearing impairment. 

Stop speaking from another room or across a large space. If I want to speak to my wife, I need to go where she is and the same is true for her.

Don’t speak with your back toward me. I need to see your mouth and body language to enhance understanding. Otherwise, all I hear is sound. When starting a new conversation, give me context like, “I want to talk to you about …….” Please do not start a conversation and continue it while walking away. Speak slowly and distinctly rather than louder. Preface a change of topic with an introduction. It takes me longer to catch on to a new topic without context.

If you want me to understand you, please don’t try to compete with other sounds in the room like the TV or radio, other people talking or while the water, fan or dishwasher are running. Steady sounds from these sources taking up most of my hearing and comprehension capacity. Those with normal hearing can usually sort out conversation from background noise. Hearing aids just amplify all the available sound and it becomes jumbled together and incomprehensible. 

If you want to speak to me, get my attention first. Say my name, tap me on the arm or do something to get me to look at you short of using a water balloon. I tend to concentrate more when reading or watching TV and I won’t understand that you want to talk to me if you don’t get my attention. 

It will help a lot if you remove obstructions to your speech. Take your hand away from your mouth, put the cigarette down, lose the gum. I don’t read lips, but do understand familiar words better by seeing your lips. Accents make comprehension much more complicated. 

Last, but not least, be patient. I will often ask you to repeat a word or phrase if I did not understand it the first or even the second time, especially if you use an unfamiliar word. 

As you might imagine, living with hearing loss can be very isolating. I cannot move about in my world as I once did. Movies and concerts are out. Lectures and speeches are gone too. Restaurants and parties are very difficult. Large groups are just noise. I can handle six people or so, but not too many more. 

Luckily, I now work as a guardian for the elderly and disabled and that allows me to use email and voicemail for much of my communication. Most of my conversations are one on one with others and most care givers understand how to communicate with those with hearing loss so speaking with them is usually easier. These environments and my aids allow me to remain productive and do work that matters. 

Living with hearing loss is not impossible, it just requires adjustments for all in order compensate for the loss.