For 40 years, Joanne Milne’s ears had never processed a sound. Words—as spoken things, not letters pressed on a page—were entirely alien to her. And by her 20s, her vision was gone, too, taken by the same rare genetic disorder, Usher’s Syndrome, which left her deaf from birth.
Earlier this month Milne, who lives in Gateshead, England, traveled 200 miles south to Birmingham, where she underwent an operation to install tiny electronic devices, called cochlear implants, that could directly stimulate her auditory nerves with electrons.
A week later, the implants were finally turned on.
“It might be a bit overwhelming,” the technician warns in the video below, before reciting the day’s of the week. “Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday…”
Overwhelming? There’s not a word in the English language that can adequately describe Milne’s reaction.
H/T Brimingham Mail | Screengrab via Birmingham Mail/YouTube