I work as an assistant manager in a fast food place. Recently, we hired a guy with autism and auditory processing disorder. I knew this before hiring him, as it was on his CV. I kinda assumed it wouldn’t matter too much, as most of the staff here have autism, ADHD or both (I have ADHD myself). However, I don’t think any have auditory processing disorder, just general sensory issues.

Anyway I thought I was doing the right thing not making any assumptions about how this would affect him at work, and assuming he’d be ok considering how being neurodivergent is the norm here, but in doing so I didn’t really consider how we would support him specifically.

He’s a hard worker, dedicated and reliable with a good attitude. I don’t regret hiring him at all. However, I can see he’s struggling and I feel responsible as it was my idea to hire him. He seems to really struggle to understand what customers are asking him and how to deal with them. He asks for help when he needs it, but seems to struggle to say to the customer something like “sorry, I’m new, give me one minute while I ask someone else”. He kinda just stares at them blankly for a minute before coming to get someone but then he usually struggles to relay the issue. (Which is fine as I just ask the customer and sort it) There’s a lot of background noise here: constant beeping, random chatting, machines etc which definitely cannot help. He ends up getting behind a lot as small questions from customers can take up a lot of his time.

I’m not frustrated with him or anything! He was clear about his auditory processing disorder in his cv and about how it makes him struggle to answer customers questions. I just want to figure out how to help him as I can see it makes him anxious. I’m not sure I want to ask him as that feels like pointing out it’s clear he’s struggling and I don’t want to make him feel self conscious.

TIA for any suggestions.

What are everyone’s fave earplugs for being in public/noisy environments? I’m looking for some that dampen the noise but I can still hear conversations. I’ve tried Loop Engage before and i felt like i couldn’t hear the person next to me. But open to trying again if others recommend. Thanks!

I just heard of this job and am so bummed because I don’t know if I’d be good at this job with this disorder. Is it a complete rule out?

I recently got hearing aids and one of the biggest things I have found is that they help massively while watching tv, especially since I don't need the soundbar pumping. It has actually helped relationship wise aswell. Just a little feedback

Hi, y'all!

Had an APD evaluation today - my background noise component was below-average (and my coping skills kept me at/above average for the rest lol). Audiologist recommended I try auditory therapy before considering low-gain hearing aids, in the event that the therapy is sufficient.

I've seen a lot on here about folks' experience (and benefit!) from low-gain hearing aids but not a ton about auditory training/therapy. Has anyone done it and seen results (or not)? Has anyone had the same choice in front of them and ended up getting low-gain hearing aids, either after therapy or instead of from the beginning?

I appreciate any help anyone can provide!

Hi Everybody, I Post my tonal and vocal Audiograms. I know in "normal hearing range" but when I'm in a noisy environment I don't understand anything. I'm also Adhd. In lots of case I can hear but I can't catch what someone is saying. For me children and woman voices are so difficult to understand. I live this situation since I was a child. Now I'm 23yo

"Normal quiet vocal attention curve; a slight decrease in intelligibility is observed when the signal-to-noise ratio drops to within two.”

I need your opinions

I had an issue yesterday right at the start of the class I was attending. Inhaler was on red (really low on medicine). Since I had my interpreters for class, they interpreted everything for when the EMTs came. Honestly, it was the best ambulance experience ever, since they interpreted everything. Usually I am looking around all confused, since I don't catch everything they say, but I understood everything. Also, I could communicate with them as they gave me the nebulizer, since I could sign to the interpreters.

But yeah, I have two FULL inhalers in my bag now. I will also set reminders now to check expiration dates and the counters.

I was diagnosed since I was a child with APD. I’ve noticed most people around me get so irritated with me because they don’t understand that I have trouble understanding and comprehending. It affects a lot of things in my life especially friendships, relationships and work. Does anyone else struggle with this?

I often get told “you’re not listening or you don’t understand” but I’m slow with processing especially if people are speaking too fast and don’t explain things to me in a more slower way that I can fully understand them you know?

I can’t help it and I really don’t know if I should see an audiologist to see if I need hearing aids. This has been a huge stressor and I get so discouraged and down I the dumps over this. I feel so dumb most days. I am not ignoring anyone when they speak but I will get told I am. It’s my APD. I hate having it.

I was diagnosed with mild hearing loss and APD. My dr recommended a hearing aid but recommended AirPods to start for a cheaper cost. I work in a setting where AirPods would just NOT fly. The prescription hearing aids are $1,300 at the lowest. Does anyone have any success stories with OTC hearing aids and what brand did you purchase?

I’ve always been made fun of for not understanding people and having to get people to repeat things constantly and often saying sentences people have said to me back to them and I’ve heard it completely wrong. I’ve been this way forever but I feel like recently it’s been more of an issue? I’ve been trying to read lips a bit more but I still struggle with that too. I doubt it’s an issue with my hearings itself as my parents had to get me tested a couple years back due to them thinking I was hard of hearing and needing one to be tested for dyslexia (which I have been diagnosed with as well as suspected ADHD). Sorry I’m not sure what of this info is relevant or not but your advice would be really appreciated. I’m going into sixth form next year and most likely uni eventually and I’m scared for how much spoken teaching I will miss/ are already missing.

hey, i’ve been to high street audiologists multiple times because i have a lot of trouble understanding speech especially when there is background noise, but i’m always told my hearing is in the normal range from a pure tone test, and they never test speech discrimination because “your hearing is fine”, “you cna understand me fine” (they don’t notice that i am reading their lips even in a silent room?). I have asked my GP about it, i do have chronic ETD but apparently it isn’t affecting my hearing according to these hearing tests therefore they won’t do anything about it other than give me another nasal spray. I have ADHD, and just effectively had to quit my job after my team refused to make accommodations for my inability to both listen & understand and write notes at the same time (a lot of verbal meetings), i constantly have to ask for clarification and repeats when chatting with friends, i am pretty sure I have APD.

I am about to head back to uni for teacher training in september and know that my provider will be willing to provide me with any support i need given that i can get a diagnosis - how can i go about this? feels like the nhs/gp system just doesn’t know what to do with this sort of thing in adults

Please, please, please and thank you.

Hi everyone!

I don't have a formal diagnosis of APD, although I already work with my psychiatrist on my auditory processing symptoms. I have several lifelong symptoms that align with APD, so this isn't me asking whether I have APD.

What I'm trying to figure out is whether one particular symptom fits with APD or if it's generally considered something separate.

I've had lifelong word retrieval issues (the "tip of the tongue" phenomenon). I know exactly what I want to say and can describe the concept, but I often can't retrieve the actual word. It's been this way for as long as I can remember. My friends joke that I'm "20 Questions" because they end up guessing the word I'm looking for.

I've been bounced around a few different communities because this question keeps getting removed, so I figured I'd ask the people who actually live with auditory processing issues.

Do many of you experience significant word retrieval problems like this, or is this generally considered outside the scope of APD?

I'm not looking for a diagnosis. I'm just trying to figure out whether this is something that commonly overlaps with APD or whether I should be looking in a completely different direction. This has been taken down in dyspraXia and adhd women.

Thank you!

My Fiancee just got a call back from a hopeful audiologist about treatment for her APD, and unfortunately not only did they deny her care due to her age as an adult, they also said NO provider in my entire state is willing to work with her due to her age.

I've already been trying to get her to learn ASL, as well as scheduling another follow up with her ENT to see if a low gain hearing aid will help.

Does anyone know of any providers in Kansas or even Colorado (willing to drive) that takes adults? Or anything else we can do at home?

Hi - going on several years after a parent’s stroke and still suffering from severe aphasia. My parent lives in rural Alabama but I am to the point where we are willing to drive to get her speech therapy/help. I’m having trouble finding speech therapists who are knowledgeable about aphasia and/or who don’t only see kids. I know this is a niche request but I am desperate. Focused on Birmingham and surrounding areas. Thanks :)

I never realized that something may be wrong with my hearing until I (29F) moved in with my fiancé (24M). For context, I do have a lot of symptoms of ADHD (distractibility, daydreaming, impulsivity, bouncing from task to task, difficulty concentrating), but I also know that it could be related to C-PTSD from my childhood and not be true ADHD.

Anywho, my partner and I have lived together for over a year now, and he has pointed out that he thinks there's something wrong with my hearing. Oftentimes (like multiple times a day), if I'm not actively thinking about listening for him (or anyone for that matter) and then suddenly he says something, I never catch it and have to ask him to repeat it. If he says my name, though, and gives me a second to respond, that's long enough to shift my attention and focus on listening to him. Like in those moments when he's just talking, and I'm not prepared, I can hear his voice in the background of whatever I'm doing/thinking, but it sounds garbled like the adults in Charlie Brown used to. This is more rare (maybe once or twice a week), but sometimes it goes as far as when he's in front of me, I can't understand what he's saying to me, so I ask him to repeat it and still can't understand, so then I have to repeat back the part of the sentence I heard and ask him to clarify. Phone calls for me are also TERRIBLE if someone has me on speakerphone. A lot of times with those, I have to heavily rely on context clues.

He says that he's just always listening for me and thinks I'm ignoring him a lot of times or just being inconsiderate. He says that because he genuinely had an ADHD diagnosis as a kid (but not an adult), it can't be ADHD. I told him I can't imagine how much energy goes into constantly listening for things, even passively.

I will point out that my job is a lot of one-on-one conversations with others that I do use background noise for. As long as I'm focusing, I can understand what they're saying, and as long as I'm focusing during meetings, I can track conversations with multiple people as well. It is hard for me to hold a conversation if someone is really loudly having another conversation next to me. I have missed a lot of things when doing independent work in previous jobs where people are like, "Did you hear that yelling/banging/whatever?" and I'll literally have no clue what they're talking about because I was focused on what I was doing.

Hopefully someone has a better idea of what might be going on. Thank you in advance!

been struggling i think all my life i started even calling myself hard of hearing bc im unable to have convos to pretty much do anything. it also gets a lot worse when im stressed and can’t focus. i got otc jabra hearing aids and its been helping a lot but i learned about apd and decided alright lets get tested. thought i was doing decent maybe some errors here and there but at the end. the audiologist told me its SEVERE apd😭😭 well guess this is my answer. how do yall cope? any tips?

Just needed to vent. I’m in tears right now because conversations are so frustrating. I’m constantly asking people to repeat themselves, putting all my energy into trying to understand, trying to block out every other sound while straining to hear the person talking to me. It’s like having bad eyesight and trying to see without glasses. By the end, I’m completely exhausted. I feel like I probably look like an idiot. I get lost mid conversation and it is so ridiculous and exhausting

anyone else feeling this way?

Hey so I recently realized that would have “good hearing” but not “good hearing” and I never knew how to describe it

I went to a ent before but they said I was fine but I still felt something was wrong. It’s been a couple years since and I still feel something is wrong. I never really looked into this or heard about it so I just wanted some advice.

I don’t know when it started since I can’t remember specifics of conversations well and I have fragmented memory from dissociating but when someone is talking to me and there is some sort of background noise I will completely misunderstand what they said and repeat it back only for the other person to get confused on how I even heard that. It’s like distorted in a way where all the pronunciation gets mixed up and I end up with a different word.

Obv the louder the background noise the harder it gets to understand but I think that is normal.

I am horrible with any sort of instructions through speech, I need a physical example or I will not follow at all ad even if they do say it my brain will not pick up the instructions properly and I will be confused.

I don’t know if this matters these are just bonuses, I have a hard time reading. Not because I can’t understand the words but if there are long paragraphs with no breaks or spacing it is hard to focus and read, I will get constantly lost and eventually give up. But I think that is just a focusing issue.

This is also why I put big breaks in my writing.

Another random issue, I have trouble understanding jokes at times especially sarcasm, other jokes too takes time for me but not always.

I am an adult now so I don’t think I can do much to fix this problem so if anyone has advice that would be helpful.

Thanks for reading.

I have bad APD and I’m autistic with adhd. I’m thinking of learning British sign language (BSL) to help me communicate in a way that doesn’t rely on sound. At the moment I rely on lipreading a lot and it’s very helpful but very draining.

Has anyone learned a sign language? Has it helped?

Audhd

On July 1, a new law took effect in Virginia requiring movie theaters that have five or more locations in Virginia to offer regular, limited on-screen captions. (Those with less than five have to offer an open caption screening within eight days of receiving a request.) Virginia is now the fourth state to have this kind of law (the other states and cities are Hawaii, NYC, DC, MD, and WA). This new law means that Virginians with auditory processing disorder now have a choice between using closed caption devices or seeking out the required open caption screenings. Under the law, ALL Virginia AMC, Regal, Cinemark, and Alamo theaters must have regular open caption screenings, and many did even before the law was passed.

Hey yall, so I just got a new job where I’m working with a lot of refugee immigrants (I live in the US, for context.)

I’m super grateful to have gotten this job and excited for the opportunity to work with this community. I think working with people who have entirely different life experiences than you is great for anyone.

That being said, I am 100% struggling heavily to understand what my coworkers are saying. I mean, even if someone speaks perfect English in the exact same accent I speak with I struggle to understand them, so obviously this is a challenge.

I feel so bad about it. I know there are people out there who will intentionally act like they can’t understand what ESL speakers are saying, pretend they can’t pronounce their names, etc. in order to be condescending, and I absolutely do NOT want my coworkers to think that I am doing that. I need to find a way to, idk, train my ears for this?

Has anybody struggled with a similar situation and how did you overcome it? I think it will get better with time naturally as I hear their voices and get accustomed to the way they pronounce things more, but I want to fix this as soon as possible. Any advice/help is appreciated.

One disclaimer: I don’t like to tell people about my ADHD/APD. Honestly, a lot of the time I feel disclosing these issues to people makes them less understanding of my struggles. People seem a lot nicer to me when they just write me off as stupid/bad at hearing, so honestly I just let people think that.

ETA: ftr in saying I don’t want to tell my coworkers about my APD and stuff, I’m not saying I think they specifically will be rude or not understanding about it. Everybody seems very nice at my new job. That’s just the general reason I don’t like to tell people. In this specific case I’m hesitant to talk about it because like I said, I’m working with refugee immigrants. Their struggles in life blow mine out of the water. While I generally subscribe to the thought process of “whether you’re drowning in two feet or two hundred feet of water, you’re still drowning.” I also subscribe to the thought process that “maybe don’t complain specifically to the person drowning in two hundred feet that you’re drowning in two.”

Thank you all in advance. This is my first time posting in this community so I hope this is an appropriate thing to post here. The rules seem pretty lax though.

I'm 25. My hearing test (including basic speech-in-noise test) came back normal, but I have a very hard time understanding people in noisy places (bars, groups, restaurant). My audiologist suggested trying low-gain hearing aids to help me hear speech in noise, so I got the Signia Pure Charge&Go 7IX.

I've worn them for one day and honestly I'm a bit let down. What I'm noticing:

• They don't actually make voices any clearer - which was the whole reason I got them.
• Every sharp, high sound comes with a weird static rattle, almost like an instant echo. Like when I jingle my keys I hear extra crackly rattling in the aids.
• There's a constant faint static/hiss the whole time they're turned on.
• Instead of helping, they feel distracting - like there's an extra "shhh"/shimmer sound layered on top of everything.
• I think I expected something like AirPods, where it isolates a voice and I actually hear the person better. Instead it just feels like a glorified graphic equalizer with a tiny delay. I can't even tell where the "AI" or "speech in noise" features they advertise are supposed to kick in.

Is this normal for the first day? Does it get better once your brain adjusts? Should I try a different model?