21/01/2026
Listening Fatigue! What’s that? Shout out to Mama Hu Hears for helping with some incredible resources as our son was going into Prep (screenshot at the end).
Listening takes work, real work for Deaf/Hard of Hearing kids and people. Listening fatigue can mean an increase in behaviours for children (and adults like me!).
For Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) children and adults, listening isn’t passive.
It’s constant work.
• Filling in missing sounds
• Filtering background noise
• Switching between lip-reading, devices, context, and guesswork
• Doing all of that while learning, socialising, or working
By the end of the day, many DHH people aren’t ‘behaving badly’ or being ‘difficult’, they’re exhausted.
What listening fatigue can look like:
• Meltdowns or shutdowns after school/work
• Headaches, irritability, or emotional overwhelm
• Withdrawal, zoning out, or refusal to engage
• Needing quiet, space, or reduced demands
• Appearing ‘fine’ until they’re suddenly not
And importantly, this affects adults too, myself included!
Listening fatigue doesn’t disappear when you grow up. It just becomes more hidden.
Support doesn’t mean ‘letting them get away’ with things, it means lowering unnecessary load:
💙 Build in quiet recovery time
💙 Reduce background noise where possible
💙 Allow breaks from (hearing) devices when safe
💙 Lower the sound load: turn off background noise, choose quiet environments, reduce talking. Choose personal devices over family devices if that works for you and your family.
💙 Reduce demands: no plans, no pressure, no ‘shoulds’. I said to my husband on the weekend ‘today we are doing less than nothing’
💙 Support regulation: rest, familiar routines, visual supports, comfort activities, silence if needed. Dark, cold and silent works for myself and my kids - what works for you?
💙 Schedule therapy and other activities earlier in the day and week where possible
💙 Reduce demands
💙 Remember: rest is a reasonable adjustment
If your DHH or neurodivergent child (or you) are wiped & exhausted, that’s not antisocial, it’s neurological, it’s listening, auditory, processing and/or cognitive fatigue. It’s not laziness. It’s not a failure. It’s science!
Give yourself (and your kids) permission to land softly. You actually don’t need permission to slow down, but if you’re a reforming people pleaser and over achiever… this is your permission 🙌🏻
- Your DHH Neurodivergent Mum @ BleuDore 💙
