Deaf children who grew up in the hearing world only

shel90

shel90

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For those who grew up not knowing any sign language or any other deaf people, did this happen to you as a child?
 

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That was how I learned to fool my teachers, my peers, and especially my parents into thinking that I was doing great as an oral-only deaf. I mastered that skill so well so I know what kinds of expressions to use by judging other hearing people's expression on what the topic was about. lol
 
LOL of course!!! I tend to NOD when they ask me if i understood. eh. Wait a minute, Except deaf school or deaf events. ;)

I am an ASL user all my life but not exaclty ASL but still a form of sign language when i was a kid. I am in the hearing world all my life because I lived with my hearing family.
 
Yep. Goes hand-in-hand with the smile-and-nod feature we have! :)
 
Of course, some of us use that technique around fluent signers.

(Cough, cough) well, not me personally, of course... hee hee. :roll:
 
Goodness me!! That was me all along and still sometimes now when trying to lip-read.
 
shel90 said:
For those who grew up not knowing any sign language or any other deaf people, did this happen to you as a child?
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Umm...don't know if you consider me part of this group. My parent didn't find out that I was deaf until I was 2.5 years old. They did oral method until family moved to where they live now; and somehow my cool aunt convict them let me learn some form of sign language (SEE later become more of PSE signer). Interesting thing is I was allow sign at school, but not at home. So home always has been "oral ground". But I know I do that a lot of nodding at home regardless if I fully understand what going on around me or not. LOL
 
I must be the only disagreeable deaf person. I keep telling people I don't understand.
 
Yep, been pretending to be happy most of my life, but was very lonely.

I thought everyone around me was happy and when I see hearing people all mingling and laughing, they must be talking about something interesting.

Now that I can participate in conversations better, I realize things are not what they seem. It may seem like everyone is smiling and happy, but what they really are doing is complaining about how stupid other people are.

Trust me, y'all are not missing much, but, still, it would have been nice to know what they were saying.
 
I too am an expert at this. It's hard sometimes to know when to ask for a repeat because by the time I figure out if I understood or not they moved on. I've never met a herring person that could understand this.
 
Cheetah said:
I too am an expert at this. It's hard sometimes to know when to ask for a repeat because by the time I figure out if I understood or not they moved on. I've never met a herring person that could understand this.
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Yep, I do understand that BIG TIME!!! I tell my family that usually I don't reliazed that I am not understand the topic the right way (especially the jokes). Nor do I want to ruin the joke or mood of the room by asking them same old song "what I didn't get that. Mind repeat what just said".

Also how often do you get "Oh it's not important" or "Never mind" when you ask people to repeat. GRRR!!! Sad thing it still happening and I have been an adult with full time job for quite some time now. Sigh...
 
I mastered the "masking" technique a decade ago. sigh.
 
Yes, all the time, master at fooling people into thinking I understand what they just said. I understand people well, but not their speech. I read body language and facial expressions, anything visual. Not anything new under the sun for those of us who are Deaf. Born deaf, no sign language for 45.5 years, began learning sign language 2.5 years ago. Raised in a hearing family, married hearing, children all hearing, immerged in hearing world, still finding my footing in local Deaf community.

Get people saying: You speak very well, you seem to follow the conversation, so you're ok right?

Tired, so tired in fact, I am still fighting for my right to be completely voice off.
 
So true, I nod right time and shake my head right time and I usually can do this by body language of hearing person and face expression. If they look positive side I nod, if they look negative side I shake. I do get timing wrong sometimes but amazed get it right most of time that I don't have clue what they saying.
 
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