"I was profoundly deaf in my early childhood (unknown to my parents until discovered later), and corrected by surgery when I was five.
Same here, but we didn't catch it in time, and surgery wasn't an option, although hearing aids have helped for the last 29 years."
I went the opposite way. I had "20-20" hearing most of my life and then virus struck several times, degrading my hearing several steps downward until I was left with about 40%.
I'm still better off than deaf people in that regard, but having had great hearing taken for granted has made the loss hard to take.
My hearing aids, though digital, amplify everything better than they amplify speech. As for being in any room where more than one person is talking, forget speech recognition.
Mine find a balance in the middle somewhere and balance the noise level. Each hearing aid of mine has the computing power of at least 2.1 GHz desktop computer, and they have the computing power to adjust the volume level to slight variations depending on the volume level of the surroundings or noise and the persistance of such noise, like lawnmowers, vacuum cleaner, etc.
What part of the ear did the virus damage?
This is so heartbreaking.
The same thing that happened to you happened to me, except in my right (dominant) ear only, it happened suddenly (Sudden Sensory-Neural Hearing loss) and I am essentially completely deaf in that ear. It was very traumatic at first...took several months to adapt to it.
I can hear some very low (and very loud) tones, which don't happen in normal life that often...wouldn't ya know it, I *can* hear those irritating bass boom-boxes. It's distorted and annoying, but I can hear it.
Even today people don't realize I'm deaf on that side and can startle me pretty badly if they speak to me on that side and I don't know they're there and I turn and see them! LOL! Makes me jump!