Hard of Hearing culture? Hah!
Sorry if the title sounds offensive to some, but I mean no offense. I have many thoughts that are going million miles a minute and I can’t sleep. I suddenly remembered reading about how hard of hearing people kick themselves in the rear when there is a communication break down. I couldn’t agree with the statement more when I first read that sentence. I then remembered how my attempts to make myself loud and clear in things I need, is failing and falling apart (I am getting an appeal, however, so that is sure to boost my self-esteem.)
Hard of hearings depend heavily on devices, and trying to learn or re-learn how to speak and lipread as well as listening (probably the most difficult), and all the stuff we have to learn in order to be successful in the Hearing world. I got angry when the captioning for House tonight was not shown because of the primary results about the election was being shown once awhile. When the election primary results did come up, the captioning stops. I don’t give a frack about the results of the primary until after the show is over. Not to mention that the captioning stopped for a full minute when the primary results did show up at the bottom of the screen, thus, making me miss out some of the plot that is happening that I wanted to know.
While this would have affected everyone in the Deaf World, HoH and Deaf alike, it only served me as a reminder that I can’t fully comprehend the speech of the television, no matter how successful I appear to be as a HoH person.
HoH President Now! scenario would never happen, because HoH people is an invisible group, (after all, there is no such thing as HoH Culture) only making ourselves heard when we cannot understand what the other person is saying. And that, sometimes, makes us even more less sure of ourselves because we are taught that to be anything less than a hearing person, is defective. Which sure raise our self-esteem by leap and bounds. /sarcasm
If I really did have a half a penny for every time I kicked myself in the rear for any type of miscommunication break down, I would surely be a millionaire by now. My self-esteem is low right now, and I don’t know what to do at this point (besides appealing to get CART services as FM system is not working). My life is quite literally a blank road after this semester ends and the prospects are frightening and not having gained any self-esteem by the semester’s end in making myself heard without sounding like a bitch, well, I’m not sure what I can do.
Looking and sounding like a bitch is one of the last thing I want to do. So I never speak up for things I really need. My note taker in Art History ceased and I really want to tell her to continue taking it for me because I found out that the ‘rough draft’ paper is supposed to be an outline form… augh, but at least I’m really communicating with the teacher for anything I missed and is willing to overlook the actual rough draft and not outline. But it’s still stressful for not knowing what’s going on in the classroom. And I don’t want to approach the note taker to tell her that I still need the notes and appear bitchy because she doesn’t want to do the work.
I really keep to myself too much at school, I rarely interact and when I do, it’s during art, but even then, it’s only a hi and a few casual words like “what’s up?” I badly want to interact, but I don’t want any communication break down and keep kicking myself in the rear. The fear of communication break down prevents me from interacting with anyone, and that really, really gets me down on most days because in the end, I don’t have anyone to hang out when school is not in session.
I tried joining tournaments and clubs last semester, but to no avail because of my fear of communication break down. I thought, this is not fair, why am I stuck with this situation? I didn’t really understand why, but somehow, I kept trusting God to help me stay strong. I have remained strong ‘til now. I want to cry out at this unfairness of being a hard of hearing person, even though I literally can’t hear a sound of a gun shot or fireworks when my CI is off. I’m not hearing anything right now because I am supposed to be sleeping now.
All of this makes me realize how hard it is for everyone else with an hearing loss and who try to be in the Hearing world without knowing or avoiding the Deaf Culture. I will admit, I love my CI so much that I seriously considered being an audiologist for CI and being an advocate. Back then I was living in the bliss of ignorance, not knowing an iota of the Deaf Culture. I thought that deafness was seriously something to be cured with and that everyone wanted to hear sounds. I couldn’t even imagine anyone not wanting to hear (but now I kind of understand why some don’t.) That was me about three years ago now, not very long ago, was it?
And today… my thoughts about being an HoH person and how I deal with being as such is falling apart. I’ve stated in the past blogs that I’m sick of how I was dealing with things as a HoH person, but I hadn’t fully comprehended what it was doing to my self-esteem–yet, I did have some ideas what was happening to my self-esteem. I knew I was down sometimes, but I didn’t realize the full depth of how much it was personally affecting and hurting me. When I went to the Orlando retreat for the Deaf/Blind, I realized how outgoing I really was, or rather, remembered, and now that I am back and it’s been a week and half since then. Because of that, I remembered of who I really was, it really had me feeling down.
Sure, I can interact freely one on one, provided that there is no background noise, and that the person has good voice for me to hear. My success as a ‘hearing’ person is pretty high and can fool anyone into thinking that I am not deaf once getting a job. Not so sure about afterwards though… And that’s where the line crosses and my confidence is lowered.
I really wish such a world or even a country, is mainly made of deaf people. (link)
This post was inspired by Deaf Culture Website: HoH
10:39 pm | 6 Comments »
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Comment by moi — January 30, 2008 @ 12:14 am
You may interest in 3 deaf scammer!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqszdaaNLEc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQ-rRBSNvHw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQjWo5cfhyw
Please spread truth out!
Comment by KTB — January 30, 2008 @ 1:26 am
It’s true and it’s unfortunate, hard of hearing people are stuck in no man’s land, they are neither deaf nor hearing and they are almost always ignored.
Hang in there!
Comment by SlackinPenguin — January 30, 2008 @ 11:03 am
I am hard of hearing but deaf without hearing-aids so I am often stuck between deaf and hearing world. When deaf ignores me, hearing accepts me, I then hang around with hearing people.
Comment by James T Beaton — January 30, 2008 @ 4:53 pm
Welcome, fence-sitter! I know where ya coming from, smack in the middle between two worlds. There are a number of us in no-man’s land here, and we’ll be there for ya.
Comment by Ann_C — January 30, 2008 @ 6:07 pm
I was just thinking about all these same things and wanting to blog about them when I saw your blog. We’re feeling the same today. (((((((BIG HUGS))))))) :-)
Comment by kim — January 30, 2008 @ 10:43 pm