Helen Keller is credited with having said that, “Blindness cuts us off from things, but deafness cuts us off from people.”

Most of us are lucky enough to retain our eyesight throughout our lives, but the reality of aging is that hearing loss for most of us becomes a fact of life.

In 2017, I wrote an article about the problems many of us — men in particular — have dealing with the perceived stigma or embarrassment associated with wearing hearing aids. The truth is that, for many men and women, vanity is a factor.

It is estimated that 35 million Americans have some hearing impairment, but only about 10 million, or 28 percent of them, wear hearing devices.

If you’re reading this and fall into the category of people who don’t hear quite as well as you used to, or who are always asking friends to repeat themselves, this article may motivate you to finally do something about it, as there is now a strong link between hearing loss and memory loss.

Age is a significant factor for hearing loss, and new research has uncovered a form of loss called “central hearing loss” that affects the brain’s sound processing abilities, unlike what is called “peripheral hearing loss” caused by problems with the inner ear and hearing nerves. Researchers also discovered that people suffering from central hearing loss have an increased risk for mild cognitive impairment, or early stage memory loss.

While this may not sound significant — as many people cope well with MCI, which doesn’t negatively impact their ability to perform daily tasks — having MCI doubles your risk of developing full-blown Alzheimer’s disease.

Now that should get your attention.

Knowing that something as simple as having your hearing tested, and then having the good common sense to do something about acquiring aids to help you hear if needed, should motivate you, and may spare you a future as an Alzheimer’s patient.

That’s the “good” news.

The bad news is that Medicare does not pay for hearing aids, and many health/medical insurance policies do little or nothing to mitigate the very high cost of quality hearing aids. That creates a dilemma, because it forces many of us to decide if we want to spend the thousands of dollars on today’s incredible, smart digital hearing aids, or risk advancing memory loss.

I wear hearing aids, and to be honest, at first, I had to overcome the self-inflicted embarrassment of doing so.  They also take some time to get used to, as they don’t “fix” hearing loss. They amplify the discrete sounds so you can hear what others with no loss can hear.

For me, I can now hear the voices of my grandchildren, the voices of people with higher pitch ranges and phone conversations, and I can once again hear the birds sing.

What I also noticed, as I’m now a full-time wearer of hearing aids, is that I’m in a very big “club” of hearing device wearers.

Today’s hearing aids aren’t bulky or very obvious. I can promise you that the people in your life won’t notice your hearing aids, but they will notice that you’re now responding to their voices and no longer asking them to repeat themselves during conversations.

Mitigating hearing loss, improving hearing and communications and reducing the risk of going from MCI to Alzheimer’s disease certainly seem to me to be good reasons to pursue improved hearing.

Ron Kauffman is a consultant and expert speaker on issues of aging. He is the author of “Caring for a Loved One with Alzheimer’s Disease.” He may be contacted at 828-696-9799 or at drron561@gmail.com.