‘Sweet Dreams are Made of Cheese’: The Challenges and Humor with Hearing Loss

Have you ever listened in on a conversation where someone said something funny, and you laughed along, pretending that you heard the joke? Have you ever experienced confusion as to why everyone was laughing at something on TV or in a movie because you didn’t hear the setup or punchline in a joke?

It’s challenging to enjoy the humor when you can’t hear. 

What are the benefits of humor? 

A sense of humor can help people deal with stressful and painful situations. Your muscles can relax, your immune system is strengthened, it helps build trust among others, reduces anxiety and fear, and improves relationships. Humor is physically and mentally beneficial to people.    

Here’s a joke that might tickle your funny bone:

If a Deaf child swears, does his mother wash his hands with soap and water?

The Challenges with Humor and Hearing Loss

If you are hard of hearing, you may find it difficult to understand jokes and follow along with funny stories that are verbally told, because there’s always a surprising twist, use of wordplay, or punchline that needs to be heard to make sense of it. It’s very important to hear every single word and the way it’s delivered to get the joke. That’s not always possible if you can’t hear clearly. Even relying on context clues can prove to be challenging. 

Some people with hearing loss may isolate themselves from situations that incorporate comedy because they know that they won’t get the joke and feel left out when they don’t laugh at the right time, or at all. 

There are so many different categories of humor like dry, satire, slapstick, situational, self-deprecating, wordplay, etc. In order to understand the humor, you need to pay attention to a person’s demeanor and emotion when they set up their joke or story. Usually, the speaker becomes excited and talks louder when telling a joke.

It can change based on the type of humor. For dry humor, the speaker may show little emotion or facial expressions when delivering their lines. As a result, someone with hearing loss who relies on reading facial expressions as a context clue may have a harder time understanding the joke.    

Based on how severe your hearing loss is, hearing jokes can be a great listening exercise. If you’re hearing is too severe, you can still enjoy physical comedy or situational humor. 

Funny Mishearings

How about when you listen to a song? Have you ever and misheard the lyrics?

Sometimes, mishearing something that was said can turn into a funny situation with the people that you are communicating with. 

Have you heard of TLC’s rare recording of “Don’t go, Jason Waterfalls”?

How about Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams” where Annie Lennox sings, “Sweet dreams are made of cheese”?

Stop feeling left out, and enjoy hearing jokes again. Contact us at Pure Sound Hearing for a free hearing test and consultation. 

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