Earlier she wowed audiences on "America's Got Talent," Mandy Harvey overcame depression after the loss of her hearing by rediscovering her vocalization.

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Vocaliser Mandy Harvey is raising her voice to assist change perceptions of people living with a hearing impairment. Epitome via Hearing the Call

Despite having consummate loss of hearing, Mandy Harvey sang her way to a fourth-identify end on the television evidence "America'southward Got Talent" in 2017.

However, her journey to the spotlight wasn't an easy one.

Harvey began progressively losing her hearing from the fourth dimension she was born. When she was a child, she was diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS), a disease that weakens the connective tissues of the body.

"In that location were moments when yous stop agreement certain things, and and then you go through the day, and you realize that you couldn't really hear certain things anymore, that they were figments of your imagination of what y'all thought you could hear," Harvey said. "I'll never forget the moment I realized I could no longer hear my zipper."

In addition to hearing loss, EDS caused her to have several other complications including knee issues, which required surgery.

"I had nearly six or seven major procedures starting my senior year of high school through that first year of CSU, and I was on a lot of medications and nether a lot of stress during that whole catamenia," she said.

Despite the deterioration of her hearing, Harvey wanted to pursue a career in music.

In fact, well-nigh ten years before she wowed audiences on "America's Got Talent," Harvey was a music education student at Colorado Country University. It was there she first noticed she could no longer hear.

"I was in a music theory class and I had my hearing aids on. I was waiting for the dictation test to offset, which is when you listen to the piano and note rhythm for rhythm what'south happening. I was staring at my instructor waiting for the examination; I just couldn't do it," Harvey told Healthline. "I was dropped from the form."

Losing her ability to keep on with music was overwhelming for Harvey who had been in choir since she was four years old.

"Being dropped from that class in college meant I could no longer exist a music major. I went into scrambling mode because I had another knee surgery coming upwards, and I didn't fifty-fifty have time to be able to procedure it all," she said.

After transferring to another class, Harvey was able to finish the semester, but and then dropped out of CSU.

That's when Harvey's life took another rough turn.

One day she was hit by a bicyclist who couldn't stop on water ice. Although the bicyclist was shouting for Harvey to move, she couldn't hear him.

"It was a very dark fourth dimension for me. I was but trying to effigy out life at a certain point and I only started working actually difficult to keep upward. Once life started to settle down, that'south when I had enough time to really procedure what happened. And that's when I started spiraling," she said.

Co-ordinate to a study past the National Institute on Deafness and Other Advice Disorders (NIDCD), more than than 11 pct of people with hearing loss too had low compared to only 5 percent of people who said they had splendid hearing.

"People with hearing loss may struggle in social settings or get embarrassed in social settings so they tin get-go to isolate themselves from people, and we're wired to have connections. That isolation can have a snowball consequence, which can include low and anxiety and other health ailments," Nora Stewart, audiologist and chief vision officeholder for Entheos Audiology Cooperative, told Healthline.

These are statistics with which Harvey says she tin can relate. She began feeling depressed presently after leaving CSU.

"There definitely were bouts of being depressed. Subsequently losing my hearing, [I was] scared and kind of went through the stages of grief that were very obvious. I was definitely bartering. And so [got] really angry and and so really sad, but I just stayed in that sadness for a really long fourth dimension, and didn't remember there would ever be acceptance," she recalled.

She says she stopped talking to people, going outside, showering, and eating.

"I had to effigy out everything again. Waking up with a different style alert clock and learning sign linguistic communication, and how to not exist afraid of the nighttime if I vicious asleep and the fire alarm went off and I couldn't hear it," Harvey said. "In that location are so many dissimilar things that preoccupy your heed."

While she took antidepressants for well-nigh six months and received counseling, she says it was mostly time and the support of her family unit that got her through.

"The hardest matter is everybody wants you to be happy subsequently v minutes of despair, and when your whole life changes, it's not something that y'all tin can simply accept and move on and be happy because everybody else is tired of you not existence happy. You go through grief so that yous tin come out of it on the other side," Harvey said.

To motivate herself to brand salubrious decisions, she made a list of pocket-sized victories she made each day, such as walking out of the business firm for the first time.

"It was a really large day and information technology was difficult, only it was a victory. And you only kind of start moving towards a different tomorrow by making one small option that is different today," she said.

Taking sign linguistic communication classes also helped besides, she said.

"My sister took them with me, which was huge. You never really empathize how much that means and how lamentable it is that most family members of people who are deaf don't take the time to acquire how to communicate with them," Harvey said.

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"I want to testify a different side of what a inability looks like and show that at that place are a lot of invisible ones," said Harvey. Image via Hearing the Call

After losing all her hearing, Harvey prepare music aside for an entire year. Then her dad asked her to play guitar with him.

"I didn't want to at first but I said yes because he'southward my dad and I love him. I was watching and watching the chord changes and doing those with him. And then eventually he asked me to larn a song to sing, which I thought was ridiculous," Harvey said.

But she accepted the challenge and began to sentinel herself sing from note to notation and feel her throat as she sang, paying attending to the vibration. She did the aforementioned with scales and and then tried to learn a unmarried line of a vocal. Then, eventually, a whole song, which took 10 straight hours of nonstop work.

"It actually was mostly just trusting myself that I was right based off of non existence able to hear myself," she said. "It ended up being quite a freeing experience to be able to sing without being able to hear myself because I tin't judge myself anymore. And that's been i of the biggest blessings for my career, not beingness able to judge myself anymore."

Regaining confidence, Harvey recorded a song in 2008 and sent it to her vocal coach.

Harvey's coach was impressed and encouraged her to start taking vox lessons again. Harvey agreed and decided jazz was what she wanted to sing. Before Harvey knew it, she was singing open mic at a jazz gild.

"In November of 2008, I showed up and I ended upward singing in front end of 7 people at a jazz lounge in Fort Collins, Colorado.

And then they asked me to come dorsum the side by side calendar week and then the adjacent calendar week afterward that, and then pretty soon I was singing 3 hours a night and having concerts at that place on Saturdays," she said.

Harvey went on to make a name for herself at other jazz clubs in Colorado. She eventually recorded an album, and began performing throughout the country. From there, her career in music took off.

And so, when the opportunity to audition for "America's Got Talent" came up in 2017, she took information technology.

"I told them I desire to encourage people, I want to show a different side of failure to show that it's okay to neglect and you have the ability to get support again. I want to prove a different side of what a disability looks like and testify that in that location are a lot of invisible ones," she said.

Today, she continues to tour nationally and internationally and is working on her fourth anthology.

If she hadn't lost her hearing completely, Harvey said she'd nearly likely be working as a choir teacher and getting her doctorate in music.

"It'south funny that people think that because I've been on Goggle box that what I'g doing is manner better than what my original dream was, and I don't think that that's necessarily true at all," Harvey said. "I retrieve that I would accept achieved a lot in my field, but I never would take gone into functioning. For music to still be my career is a huge approving."

She is particularly grateful, given the fact that more than 70 percent of deafened people are either unemployed or underemployed, co-ordinate to Communication Service for the Deafened.

"In the U.s.a., it's a known fact that with hearing loss it'due south harder to become jobs. The more astringent the hearing loss, the less income you lot brand, and then information technology affects socio-economic health," Stewart said.

To further raise awareness well-nigh hearing loss, Harvey teamed up with Hearing the Call, a nonprofit founded by Stewart that sends audiologists around the globe to provide underserved populations admission to hearing aids and care for hearing loss.

Harvey is headlining a concert serial to support the system. She hears her band by feeling the instruments' vibrate through the floor. Half of her act is singing and half is an uplifting talk.

"It'southward a privilege to exist a part of an organization that's giving the gift of communication. I don't like thinking that we're giving the gift of sound considering sound's different for every person, but the biggest isolation that I had when I lost my hearing is that I didn't have a way to talk to people and understand them," said Harvey. "I felt completely alone and that can ruin people to the core."

Through her performance she not only hopes to entertain and raise awareness for the hearing dumb, but she also hopes to inspire others to embrace who they are at the moment.

"At the stop of the day, I never actually go a full grasp of what [my music] sounds like, but at that place'southward no benefit to being upset about something that you can't change. I'd rather wait at the positives — that I go to experience these concerts differently than everyone else. It's more than special. It's mine," she said.

Harvey also pointed out that she's learned to honey the person she is today.

"This applies to whatever person. You don't necessarily need to have a inability. I mean, yous're not the same person yous were 10 years ago, right? And if you tried to chase who you were 10 years ago, y'all'd neglect."

Cathy Cassata is a freelance author who specializes in stories about health, mental health, and human behavior. She has a knack for writing with emotion and connecting with readers in an insightful and engaging fashion. Read more of her work here .