Challenges

Daredevel7 said:
I am not fluent in sign language. I took a class with my mom and aunt once when I was about 14/15 because they were offering it at church, so we decided to take it. I didn't take another class until now. I met a deaf friend who uses ASL and hooked me up with a class. I hope to be fluent, it's nice to learn multiple languages.

Since I was born profoundly deaf and wore only hearing aids for so long (I am 26 now), I am technically not such a great candidate for the CI since it takes a long time for my brain to get used to the overstimulation. So for the past few months, it's been a journey just to get used to hearing sounds this way. Right now, I am at the point that I DEFINITELY hear more with the CI than the hearing aid (it wasn't always like that, and that can give one a disappointing feeling), but learning to discriminate some speech is another long process that will take probably a year or so. The only "troubles" from the CI that I get are: loud sounds (gotta get used to it!) and eye twitching (which went away after a mapping).
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How were you communicating between ages..1-14/15? Are your parents hearing? Did they offer sign language to u?
 
jezzie_05 said:
How were you communicating between ages..1-14/15? Are your parents hearing? Did they offer sign language to u?
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My parents are hearing. I used lip-reading and spoke. I was assessed at Clarke School (an oral school for the deaf) when I was about 2 years old, and said that I could do well in a mainsteam school. I was also assessed by a speech therapist and she saw that I could understand people by lipreading and was really verbal, so she worked on my speech skills along with problem solving skills. She spied on me in pre-k and kindergarten (embarrassing) and made sure I was doing fine.

My parents did not offer sign language to me, although my mom did take a few classes to start learning before the Clarke school and speech therapist assessment.
 
Daredevel7 said:
My parents are hearing. I used lip-reading and spoke. I was assessed at Clarke School (an oral school for the deaf) when I was about 2 years old, and said that I could do well in a mainsteam school. I was also assessed by a speech therapist and she saw that I could understand people by lipreading and was really verbal, so she worked on my speech skills along with problem solving skills. She spied on me in pre-k and kindergarten (embarrassing) and made sure I was doing fine.

My parents did not offer sign language to me, although my mom did take a few classes to start learning before the Clarke school and speech therapist assessment.
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I had a speech problem until I was in 6th grade. I couldn't say my "R"s I made them sound like a "W". My teacher would dismiss me from my 6th grade class and everyone knew I was going to "speech" class, and it was horribly embarrassing at that age. I claim the teacher didn't do much of any help for me but embarrass me, and it was the embarrassment that helped fix the problem. My dad gave me a lecture about being lazy and one of my friends helped me and I overcame it....

Have your parents ever told you what it was like for them to find out that you were deaf?
 
jezzie_05 said:
I had a speech problem until I was in 6th grade. I couldn't say my "R"s I made them sound like a "W". My teacher would dismiss me from my 6th grade class and everyone knew I was going to "speech" class, and it was horribly embarrassing at that age. I claim the teacher didn't do much of any help for me but embarrass me, and it was the embarrassment that helped fix the problem. My dad gave me a lecture about being lazy and one of my friends helped me and I overcame it....

Have your parents ever told you what it was like for them to find out that you were deaf?
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My mom was terrified. She didn't know what to do. She was also sad. However, she's an action taker, so she was taking me to all those places to get me assessed and get advice on what to do next. My dad never really told me what he thought. He isn't much of a talker, especially when it comes to feelings, but I think he was very embarrassed to tell people.
 
Daredevel7 said:
My mom was terrified. She didn't know what to do. She was also sad. However, she's an action taker, so she was taking me to all those places to get me assessed and get advice on what to do next. My dad never really told me what he thought. He isn't much of a talker, especially when it comes to feelings, but I think he was very embarrassed to tell people.
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So you grew up in the hearing world..Were you happy with how you were or were you involved with other people who were deaf?
 
jezzie_05 said:
So you grew up in the hearing world..Were you happy with how you were or were you involved with other people who were deaf?
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I was pretty happy with how I was raised. I knew a few other deaf friends who were also raised orally. Of course, it wasn't easy. Sometimes I missed out things, missed group discussions, and stuff like that but I viewed it as a trade-off. However, there are many other orally raised deaf people who do not share my view, and probably think my view is self-denial or naive. Oh well. :)
 
Daredevel7 said:
I was pretty happy with how I was raised. I knew a few other deaf friends who were also raised orally. Of course, it wasn't easy. Sometimes I missed out things, missed group discussions, and stuff like that but I viewed it as a trade-off. However, there are many other orally raised deaf people who do not share my view, and probably think my view is self-denial or naive. Oh well. :)
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What do you mean deaf friends raised orally? Just by lipreading?
 
jezzie_05 said:
What do you mean deaf friends raised orally? Just by lipreading?
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Yes, we knew each other through the same speech therapist. We all talked and lipread each other. I should make a note that lipreading is technically one of the most ineffective ways of communicating for the deaf. A lot of words/letter look similar, and we often have to figure out what you are saying by the context.
 
Daredevel7 said:
Yes, we knew each other through the same speech therapist. We all talked and lipread each other. I should make a note that lipreading is technically one of the most ineffective ways of communicating for the deaf. A lot of words/letter look similar, and we often have to figure out what you are saying by the context.
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Hm, yeah, I will make a note of that also. Uhm have you ever used CART? Heard good/bad things about them?
 
jezzie_05 said:
Hm, yeah, I will make a note of that also. Uhm have you ever used CART? Heard good/bad things about them?
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No, I'm sorry. I've never had experience with those, nor have I heard from anyone personally about them.
 
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