Treat yourself with kindness and compassion, and you may find some comfort in learning from other people’s experiences

• Every week Annalisa Barbieri addresses a problem sent in by a reader

I recently became deaf as a result of meningitis. I’ve got the cochlear implant and I’m doing therapy to hear well again. I was already very shy and insecure, and, though I’ve managed to get on with my life, I now feel even more insecure and a little bit of ashamed of my condition. I am constantly asking people to repeat themselves or write down whatever they’ve said so I can understand. How can I feel more confident about this new aspect of my life?

I’m not going to offer platitudes such as “you have nothing to be ashamed of” because, although you very much don’t, me telling you different would just be very dismissive of your emotions. People often don’t want to let you explore those sorts of feelings, because they think it might be painful for you. But it’s only by mining deep into them that you can even start to process them, which is vital to minimising trauma as best one can.