About three months ago, KHTS Co-Owner Carl Goldman was told that the major hearing loss he had been experiencing in his right ear since last summer was being caused by a tumor.
Though doctors believe the tumor is likely benign, because of its connection with the blood flow in Goldman’s brain, they are currently taking a “wait-and-see” approach over six months before deciding what course of action to take.
“It’s always a challenge when something happens to you physically that people just take for granted, like hearing, so it’s made me become so aware of and appreciative of good health,” Goldman said.
He continued, “I consider myself very, very lucky because I don’t think anything I’m going through is life-threatening, or even that much of a shift in my work habits or anything else, so I’ve basically surrendered to it, embraced it for what it is and now am determined to make the best of it and work through and figure out the best ways I can overcome the challenge.”
In summer of 2017 when Goldman first started having hearing problems, he got a free hearing screening from Nola Aronson’s Advanced Audiology, adding that she has played a major role throughout the process, even working directly alongside his doctors.
“Nola has been incredible through this journey,” Goldman said. “She has been not only very, very understanding, but she’s gone out of her way to find hearing devices, hearing aids that will work best for me. In my situation, I have a little bit of a moving target still … so she’s been working with me on trying a variety of devices that will give me the best ability to hear, and then I’m going in weekly and fine tuning that so each week my hearing through the devices is getting better and better.”
Jeri Seratti-Goldman said that her husband has lost most of his hearing in his right ear, and that this may be his new reality if doctors decide not to surgically remove the tumor, making Aronson’s dedication to finding a solution that much more meaningful.
“This could be his new way of life,” Seratti-Goldman said. “(Nola’s) perseverance with this is just amazing… (She’s) trying to get something that will work, and she’s not stopping until she does.”
Goldman compared what he’s seen his father-in-law going through getting his hearing aid at a big box store to his own experience working with Aronson, saying, “The difference on a daily basis is night and day.”
“He gets decent care at one of the big box stores … and probably saves some money doing it, but he is still struggling,” Goldman said. “Because he chose to go that route instead of someone like Nola, he’s not getting the adjustments and customization that he needs.”
Looking back, Goldman noted his wife was the one to notice the changes in his hearing “long before” he realized there was a problem.
“I used to kid around that I was having listening problems with my wife, not hearing problems,” he joked. “And I’m sure a lot of other husbands thought they were suffering from listening problems, when in reality it might be a hearing problem.”
The experience of his wife noticing the issue first has been a lesson for Goldman that he is using to encourage others to get a hearing screening as soon as possible if their loved ones say they think there’s a problem.
“Maybe others can benefit from that, that if your spouse starts noticing something or others start noticing something, that should be a good wake-up call,” Goldman said. “Because the sooner you can deal with it the better. And in my case, I happen to have a tumor that supposedly only one in 100,000 people get, but the other 99,999 who are suffering from hearing losses, there are things that can be done to correct it if they catch it sooner rather than later.”
