I always told myself I would try and do some fun things with my cochlear implant (Med-El Sonnet) but I never did so reading this was like dusting off some old thoughts of mine.
I was the same, I was born relatively hearing, but started to lose it rapidly - due to a mitochondrial disease (mutation A7445G) which is very rare, but is in a few families around the world. I wore hearing aids for most of my childhood and then got the implant when I was mid 20s.
I've heard a lot of your complaints from others. My sister for example, didn't have a great journey, and even today she reckons everything is still robotic sounding. She however went with a Cochlear Nucleus system, and I was the only one in 30+ people in extended family to go with Med-El (because I liked their tech better) and it's always sounded crisp and clear to me.
I'd have liked to have gotten two, but I was only funded for one - plays havoc with directional hearing. You could have 50 people turn towards a sound, and then there's me turning the opposite direction! :)
I'd be really keen to know if you have any other experiments planned.