"If you pretend you get it and laugh, you can look silly, too," she says.

Hearing loss isn't a problem of the few. Twenty-one million Americans have some degree of hearing loss. No matter what degree of hearing loss a person suffers, communication can be tough. Both the people with hearing loss and those trying to communicate with them experience the same frustration and anger.

Fitzpatrick has taken lip-reading classes from Ellen Mastman for almost a year at the Sunnyvale Senior Center.

Fitzpatrick and her classmates have found lip-reading makes a significant difference in their lives.

Delbert Philpott, 79, says his wife, Donna, complained that he never listened to her after his hearing was damaged in a car accident.

Cupertino resident Ron Thorne, 79, finds camaraderie in the lip-reading classes.

"We have the same problem, and we are all trying to get back to the world," says Thorne, who has been taking Mastman's lip-reading classes at Avenidas Senior Day Health Center in Palo Alto. "I feel a kinship with them."

Lip-reading is taught phonetically.

Some sounds are easy to see. F, for example, is easy because the top teeth rest on the bottom lip. But then there are homophenous words that need to be understood in context. These are words that look alike when we say them--rabbit, rabid, rapid. Mastman says. "Sometimes a few key words are all you need to understand a sentence."

Mastman prefers the term "speech-reading" because lip-reading involves watching the face and body for clues, not just the lips.

"Knowing the context can do wonders," she says. "Communication is a guessing game, and information supports information, so if you can get some information with your ears and support it with more information you gather visually, you increase the chances of getting the correct message."

Mastman's classroom is an optimum place for speech-reading. Out in the real world it becomes far more difficult.

Mastman encourages her students to make changes in their environment so they can hear better, such as turning down background noise; asking others to remove cigarettes; and sitting directly across from people they will speech-read.

Mastman's student Jeanette Anderson shares tips with others with hearing loss whenever she has the opportunity. One day, when she went grocery shopping, she saw a small white board on the passenger seat of an SUV that said, "Elizabeth can't hear well. Please talk in a loud voice."

"So I left a note, saying 'if you really want to help Elizabeth, speak slowly, have the speaker look at Elizabeth, and have the light on the face of the speaker.'"

Be Giles, who has otosclerosis, tells people she is hard of hearing.

"Normally, people are willing to help," says Giles, 80. "But sometimes they look at me like I am an idiot. They think I should cover it up. I feel embarrassed although I shouldn't. I can't help losing my hearing."

"I learn to tell them specifically which part I don't understand," says Gordon Maloney, 70. "People think I am intellectually impoverished if I keep asking them to repeat themselves."

Rose Loo, 70, says she educates her family so they can help her.

"I used to get frustrated when I asked my children to repeat themselves and they said, 'It's not important' or 'Forget about it,'" Loo says. "Now I discuss with them which restaurant to go to. I also tell them to talk to my face."

Vera Colombo, 81, says she is exhausted after a whole day of lip-reading. But she practices lip-reading every day. "I go to the bathroom, lock the door, look at myself in the mirror and practice," Colombo says. "It's like learning a new language. You have to practice it."

Mastman says. "The most beautiful part of my job is watching my students become happier when they realize there are others with similar problems and that there are solutions that can help."

To sign up for lip-reading classes at the Sunnyvale Senior Center or at Avenidas Senior Day Health Center, call Ellen Mastman's voicemail at 650.949.7999, ext. 4379.