What first impression do you give out when a person meets you?

I told a guy that I was HOH and he said that he was sorry. I explained that the hearing loss was hereditary. He said that cancer and strokes run in his family. I didn't know what to say. Was this some kind of competition? Or was he just an idiot? Weird!
 
sallylou said:
I told a guy that I was HOH and he said that he was sorry. I explained that the hearing loss was hereditary. He said that cancer and strokes run in his family. I didn't know what to say. Was this some kind of competition? Or was he just an idiot? Weird!
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That's funny!...(In a way)....:laugh2:
 
sallylou said:
I told a guy that I was HOH and he said that he was sorry. I explained that the hearing loss was hereditary. He said that cancer and strokes run in his family. I didn't know what to say. Was this some kind of competition? Or was he just an idiot? Weird!
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Surely he was trying to give you comfort as he viewed your hearing as a disaster?
 
Yes, he probably does view it as a disaster. I don't think that it was intended as comfort, though. He's the kind of guy who, if you had a head ache, he'd have a brain tumor. And he's an idiot!
 
haha, yeah the worst thing is when people tell me u dont look deaf! i just wanna say thats funny u dont look stupid. wonders never cease! lol
its just lack of understanding is all!
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^bahahahahah. oh wow. i didn't know people looked deaf....duh. people are ignorant.

i'm not deaf. but i get mad how people act. just because someone's different doesn't make them stupid. you know? this world is messed up. my friends brother and sister are both deaf. and i've had to see people treat them with so much disrespect. and i'm like, "dude, get OVER YOURSELF. just because someone's different than you doesn't make you better."
 
I don't really know how deaf people are supposed to look like. I was told by another deaf girl that it's obvious how they "look around their surrounding all the time" when hearing people barely look around. I do kinda notice that with myself because I tend to look around my surrounding too much.

Signing or speaking isn't a good example of deafness, in my opinion. Any hearing can sign, and anybody can have problems with their speech (like lisp or being foreign in another country or stuttering). However, deaf accent can be fairly obvious to hearing person who have a lot of experiences with deaf people.


So, I don't really know what kind impression that I give out when I meet people. I don't live in city such as Rochester or DC where the deaf population is high. There are too many factors that someone can come up with. Sometime it might take couple of weeks for someone to figure out that I'm deaf. Most of the time, they always thought I just sound "a little off and careless with my speech"

Everyone is different when it come to giving out a impression. You might get asshole, nice person, open-mind person, closed-mind person, deaf person blah blah it's endless.
 
Hearing people have accused me of being a snob...only because I dont respond to them when they try to get my attention using their voices. Oh well.
 
I am quite shy when it come to social interaction, but only because as a deaf person with low vision, I am not entirely sure of a person's body language. Usually I am the one that speak first, but only after I can pick up the vibes and see if I am comfortable with the people. I have been told I can appear to be aspie (slang for Asperger's) from time to time. However I am told by the CNIB that is quite common for blind people to appear that way if they didn't get training on how to "appear normal" ie. smiling and making eye contacts (even if they can't see.)

I get a lot of questions if I am from Germany due to my flatten vowels or if I am Dutch or French because I use a lot of the "guttural r" yet I can't roll my r at the front of my mouth to save my life. :laugh2:

I even get people that ask if I am Irish because of the loanwords I use from the Newfoundlanders and Scottish from my hometown. :lol:

But most people are surprised to find out that I am deaf, and that I don't even follow what they are saying 50% of the time... or that I can't even lipread them that well. My excuse was that people's gestures are predictable and usually everyone have a similar way of speaking. So when they do find out that I am deaf they usually go "Oh! I didn't know you were deaf!" "Do you understand sign language?" "You tricked me" and so on. Of course, then people will start over-empathizing their mouth movements if I ask them to repeat, which makes it even harder to lipread. :roll:
 
shel90 said:
Hearing people have accused me of being a snob...only because I dont respond to them when they try to get my attention using their voices. Oh well.
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I get that too. I get comments like "oh she is too good to talk to us". Until a friend comes into my defense due to I did not hear what the others said. Once they tell them I am deaf and not ignoring them. They are actually surprised and embarrassed by what they said.
 
Whoa, I have spent very little time with others that are even as hoh as myself.
In the Alaskan construction world I am the electrician that can't hear. When I am in a new situation with people I have not worked before which does happen fairly often it is awkward at first. While I am very shy I have to force myself to take these situations head on because they will treat me like I am mentally challenged while I sort out all the clues and sounds that I do hear and lip reading that I do to know what they are saying. Especially with all the noise of the construction site going on. It takes a good day or two to get over the hump and roll with the new speakers. During this time I have had people talk REALLY
loud and roll their eyes like talking to stupid here and others that turn completely away when they talk. Others do things like walk up behind me and test to see what I don''t hear - often I don't catch them often I do and pretend not to notice. I am a big bull male but these guys mistake the smile of the hoh for weakness or stupidity. I do get the nevermind thing and make them tell. I had one new job where the obnoxious boss told me how he was sorry for me. I would like to dribble some of these yahoos like a basketball and give them the old elbow in the gut and short chop to the adam's apple but I don't and I do wade right in there and carve out my hunk of turf. Women are not as bad but often simply discount me as a viable man because I don't hear their talk. They can get into signing but I dont sigh because my life is with hearing people. I look at it as all just part of the life experience and am grateful for the hearing I have. I generally spend huge amounts of time when I am off work entirely alone.
 
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