@woodcutter I don’t think it is probably wicked annoying to the people you interact with on a daily basis, or who love and care about you, but maybe a little annoying, even to them :-) My dad was hard of hearing and it was very often a struggle to communicate with him. At first, just out of habit, I would say things to him at normal volume, then inching the volume up, until he heard me, then I went to saying things in a normal volume to him, once, because that’s the way I talk and then going straight to shouting, no inching up. It’s difficult for other people, when someone has hearing problems. You don’t forget so much as you are just used to talking the way you talk and that is not sufficient for people with hearing problems. I really, really tried to remember to always make an effort to be facing him when I spoke, because he had learned a little casual lip reading too, it helped him when he saw people when they spoke to him, like you, but it is hard to remember to do that all the time.
That your hearing has gotten worse is, or shouldn’t be, annoying to anyone. I sometimes found myself “annoyed” at my father’s inability to hear but he wasn’t annoying, I was annoyed. It was my problem, not his. If people find that annoying about you it is not your issue, it is theirs.