Let Me Tell You My Story

The earliest memory of having a problem with my hearing was in kindergarten. We were all sitting on the carpet waiting for music time and I was twiddling my hands in my lap. Suddenly, all attention was focused on me as the teacher spoke up that I needed to “keep my hands still.” In kindergarten I was with the remedial group, and it had a profound impact on me. I didn’t understand why I was being singled out. It has only come in retrospect that I could not hear in class, and so I missed too much of what was going on to follow directions and learn.

During a hearing test in kindergarten my hearing loss was discovered, but nothing was done. When the summer following kindergarten my dad was transferred to a new location a few hours away, hearing tests started in earnest. Shortly after first grade started in my new school I was fitted with a hearing aid in one ear. For some reason I was absolutely mortified to be wearing a hearing aid. I would put it on each day when I got to school, and the moment school was over I would rush to the girls restroom to take it off and shove it in my pocket until the next day. This is a pattern that would continue for years. I refused to wear my hearing aid at home. There I did not feel accepted or comfortable. A hearing aid was a major defect. My wearing a hearing aid became a huge unspoken issue in our home--the proverbial elephant in the living room. If anyone dared to mention it, I became extremely agitated, so pretty soon no one ever mentioned it.

Meanwhile, I was losing my hearing at a steady and dramatic rate. From first grade through sixth grade I lost about 10% of my hearing a year. It was a time of test after test after test. I would begin to cry because the testing was so stressful. No matter how good I was, I couldn’t hear. I couldn’t “be better.” I dreaded getting tested like nothing else, and the day I missed my first grade Halloween party (I was dressed in beautiful Raggedy Ann costume) because of “tests” was a painful one.

Also meanwhile, my brother Wayne and I had an uncanny relationship. He was a year and a half older than I was, and very different from me, but we were almost psychic. Despite the fact I wouldn’t wear my hearing aid, he and I had no problems communicating. I can’t tell you how. Maybe I lip-read. Maybe I was incredible at reading contextual cues. Whatever it was, with him I did not need to worry about communicating. It happened.

In fourth grade my hearing had become so bad that I wasn’t hearing well even with my hearing aid in. The audiologists suggested that I needed hearing aids in both ears. I remember that meeting distinctly. It was a sterile white conference room with a large table down the hall from the audiology department in the University of Wisconsin lab where I’d been receiving my testing. My parents were there. The audiologist told me their recommendation. My parents told me that it was up to me. It was my decision. To this day, my mom always says that the reason I decided agreed to get two hearing aids is because I wanted to go to college. I don’t remember that. All I recall is that was a turning point in my life. I decided to wear two hearing aids, and wear them all the time.

Suddenly I went from struggling in school to being one of the best students in the class. I’d always enjoyed learning, but hadn’t always enjoyed the process. Now I relished learning and became hungry for knowledge. I badgered my teachers for extra homework and extra credit assignments. My favorite teachers were the ones who gave lots of homework.

As a person I gained more and more confidence in myself as the years went on through middle and high schools. Much of the struggle had to do with my lack of self-confidence due to my hearing impairment, though of course some of it was the usual “growing pains.”

In high school I’d been hooked up with the Wisconsin Department of Vocational Rehabilitation Services. As a senior in high school who was college-bound, they made mention that I might receive some of my college paid for through their department. I was uncomfortable with the thought. I didn’t like to admit even to myself that I was “handicapped,” and I certainly didn’t want to get any handouts. On the other hand, I was going out-of-state to college and my parents weren’t helping pay for my education, so I was going to need all the help I could get. I swallowed my pride and accepted their services. I didn’t really need any of the other things they offered, but it was a good thing I took the help in paying for college. It is unlikely I would have been able to make it through in 4 years without DVRs assistance.

Before I left for college my mom made it clear that she was no longer going to help pay for my hearing aids. As luck (or unluck) would have it, in November of my first semester of college one of my hearing aids died. I was in a new city hundreds of miles from home and knew no one. The hearing aid center I visited did not have loaner hearing aids, and I did not have the money to buy a new hearing aid. I think my mom finally came through and lent me the money to buy a hearing aid, or perhaps the DVR came through and paid for it. I cannot recall. Meanwhile, weeks had gone by as I’d tried to find funding sources, and my classes had suffered. I’d gone to the Handicapped Services on campus, and they offered to get me a cassette recorder so I could tape my classes, but that was of no use to me since I could not understand cassettes. I approached my professors and they were completely unwilling to work with me, and some were downright rude. It was an extremely painful, stressful time.

I knew on some level that my hearing affected me in the classroom, even when I had both hearing aids, but since I couldn’t hear what I missed, I didn’t know. I compensated in the classroom, from fourth grade through college, by working extremely hard (probably harder than a lot of other students) to earn a good grade. I was extremely sensitive to contextual cues, and suffered in classes that depended on classroom discussions because I could not see the faces of the other students and conversations moved too quickly for me to follow. Later, instructors that had me as a student said I was very intense. They noticed that I focused intently when listening to them, a somewhat unusual trait. From my perspective, it took an immense amount of energy to do well in school because I had to concentrate so furiously to keep up.

I was worried about how my hearing was going to affect me on my jobs that I got out of college. In college I chose low level jobs that did not require much interaction with people. My degree in Speech Communications was probably going to put me in more situations that I would need to interact with people.

My other concern was finding a significant other to whom my hearing did not matter. I had had boyfriends throughout high school and college, but I had either felt that they were a bit uncomfortable with my hearing (and therefore me), or they were so completely oblivious as to be insensitive to my situation. I needed someone who would accept me as a whole person—including my hearing impairment. I met such a person my junior year of college. I found Doug’s speech to be difficult to understand, but he was extremely patient with me and no matter how many times I asked him to repeat himself, he would do so. While I found this embarrassing, he did not seem to notice it. At the same time I also felt a sense that while he was aware of my hearing, it just was not a big part of who I was. While my hearing actually was a huge part of who I was, I didn’t realize that at the time. I appreciated Doug’s seeing me as a person first, and my hearing impairment was part of me, just like my liking to ski, bike and go for walks.

Doug’s acceptance of me, hearing and all, was a major part of my healing as a person. I had hated myself and my impairment for so long, and never really thought of myself as a loveable person. While you might say that this has little to do with my hearing, I will respond with, “My hearing impairment has shaped my entire identity. There is never a moment that I am not aware that I am hearing impaired, because it seems like there is never a moment that I do not have something that I need or want to hear. So life is a constant struggle to make sure I hear what I need to.” For the first time in my life, I could relax and I did not have to be responsible to hear everything, because I could count on Doug to be my ears. And the realization that I was a worthwhile, loveable person led me to love myself and also led me to have more confidence.

I was going to need that support and confidence for my first job upon graduating from college: an elementary school librarian. I had always dreamed of being a librarian, but I did not particularly like kids. They were hard to understand, and the classroom setting (even of a library, which is relatively quiet) was a challenge. As I had developed coping skills in each new situation throughout my life, so I developed new coping skills now. I was known to be strict: only one person could talk at a time, you had to be quiet when someone was talking, during free time you had to keep your voices low. Such common sense things were of paramount importance because without these rules in place I would lose control of the situation and potentially miss things. I would never imagine telling the students that I was hearing impaired. That was my secret, and I protected that secret well. To have them know would mean being vulnerable to their being disrespectful. I would much rather appear slightly ditzy or incompetent or stupid than hearing impaired.

This was to be a trend throughout all my jobs. I would hide it, letting no one know I had a hearing impairment—sometimes not even my employer. Sometimes I would make mistakes because of missing something someone said, but I would never admit it for fear of appearing incapable. In my various jobs (life insurance sales, then newspaper sales) I developed coping mechanisms that allowed me to function fairly well. And as in the classroom, it took an immense amount of energy to concentrate and focus on all the information I needed. I worked extra hard to compensate for any shortcomings or mistakes I made.

It is at this point that I began to realize that many of my personality traits were at the root of my reaction and experience of being hearing impaired. I saw other hearing impaired people in the business world who did not compensate as I did—but they still had to compensate. It was at this time that I began working on my masters degree. When I had graduated from college with my undergraduate degree, I had sworn I would never go back to school. The 18 months it took me to obtain my masters degree, however, changed my life. Through a process I don’t quite understand, getting an advanced degree gave me a confidence in myself that I had never dreamed possible. Smaller class sizes and more informal teaching methods allowed me to excel in the classroom setting. Even more than that I had the awareness of standing up for what I believe in. Getting my masters degree while working full time with 2 babies at home and volunteering extensively made me question my priorities. I decided I wanted to spend more time with my family. That was leading to the next major decision in my life: my next career.

Throughout my adult life I’d had many people try to talk me into becoming a teacher, or mention that they thought I would be a great teacher. I had always dismissed them out of hand. There was no way I wanted to deal with 20 or 30 eight or ten-year-olds in the classroom. It had never occurred to me that I could teach college until I got my master’s degree. And the first time it occurred to me that I was almost done with my master’s degree and I could teach, I was so excited. Classes were in the evenings, so I could be home with the kids during the day, and my husband could watch them in the evenings. Perfect! Except on thing. I didn’t think I could teach with my hearing impairment. Uh-uh. No. Nada. I don’t think so. But the me that recognized that I was a born teacher pushed through and said, “You can do it.”

I put in my notice with my advertising sales job and took the leap of faith: I would teach. It took me a year to get the courage to mention my hearing in the classroom. I began to start every class with “my story”—this story. I saw how “my story” was touching people’s lives. I could see it in their faces as I told the story—of their own “secrets”, whatever it was that made them think that they couldn’t do whatever it was they wanted to do. They told me they thought I had a lot of courage. Yet I continued to grow, and now with three years of teaching college under my belt, I continue to grow. Now I start out every class with a handout entitled, “How to Deal With Hearing Impaired People”, and I give students concrete tips on how they can communicate with hearing impaired people—namely, me. And I tell them why, and I ask them to work with me, to help be my ears. And I tell them not to get embarrassed if I can’t hear. And I continue to tell my story because it continues to make a difference to people.

“Feel the fear and do it anyways.” Is a quote I often say to myself. That is what I did when it came to teaching. My only reason for not becoming a teacher was my hearing. I am so glad I felt the fear and did it anyways.
And if you’d like an addendum on how hearing aids have played a role in all of this…..well, they do their best. I have continued to lose my hearing, albeit more slowly now. But even with better technology I have challenges hearing. Hearing aids are a tool, but the whole system works better now that I don’t expect the hearing aids to do everything. Now I try to educate people on how to communicate with me. I no longer assume people know that I have a hearing impairment (I have short hair; they can see them, can’t they??) and tell them. I am no longer embarrassed. Now I can deal with it matter-of-factly. I enjoy walking up to people and showing them my watch saying, “These are the controls to my hearing aid,” and seeing the looks of surprise on their faces. I have fun telling them about all the different programs on my hearing aids. What had changed is my attitude. And my attitude is within my control. Whether I lose all of my hearing and go deaf, or receive a miracle surgery restoring my hearing, what ultimately matters is my attitude about all of this.