That's Fit

After traipsing through punk rock clubs for a significant portion of my adolescence -- an interest which meant my ears were almost always ringing -- I've come to worry about my hearing as I get older. On the one hand, I'm still in my twenties, and hearing loss generally only starts creeping in after 65. But on the other, it's increasingly becoming a problem for teens and young adults -- almost entirely due to the increase of loud noise.

Our ears get bombarded with everything from movie theater sound systems to leaf blowers and hair dryers. The modern world has become so noisy, that, according to the National Institutes of Health, more than 30 million American children and adults are exposed to dangerously loud noise on a regular basis.

So what can you do? Catch it early. Learn to recognize the signs of hearing loss -- are you standing closer in conversations so you can hear what people are saying? Are you turning up your car stereo louder and louder just to understand the DJs? Get your hearing checked regularly, so that if you are experiencing hearing loss, you can work with the doctor to keep what you have.

And, while the teenage me would hate the fact that I'm saying this, you could also turn down the volume.