Turn A Deaf Ear; A story about food, family, and love.

Turn A Deaf Ear, by Janet Fiore Horger & Linda Fiore Sanders, is a love story about a hearing girl who marries a deaf man and how their worlds mesh. I have been asked to read it and write about it on this blog! How exciting! The book sounds very intriguing. The publicist, Darlene Chan, has also permitted me to have a contest so one of you awesome deaf project blog readers can win a new copy of this book for yourself!
All you have to do is become a deaf project blog follower, share this blog with your friends and family and get at least 3 of them to become followers too, and comment on at least 3 of my book review posts. I plan to begin reading tonight and post updates at the end of each chapter. I should finish the 12 chapters of this book in 4 weeks, reading at least 3 chapters per week.
Deadline for contest entries will be August 7th, 2012, my 50th birthday!
Any readers that qualify will have their names put in a drawing that will produce one book winner!
What a great opportunity we get to share! Let's do this!

The book's website is www.turnadeafear.net and you can read other reviews on it's Amazon.com page too.

New Deaf Super Hero's!

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-57441370-71/marvel-creates-superhero-for-boy-with-hearing-aid/

This is definitely a company I respect. What are your thoughts?

What would really be cool is a Deaf super hero!

Or a super hero fighting cancer!

There could be a whole line of new super heros!

Letter from an adult with CI; one valid perspective

 Dear Blog readers,
The following is copied from an email I received from a friend of a friend, who began wearing her CI as an adult. She blessed me by her willingness to answer my questions (in black) for the sake of my learning more about the Deaf and HoH cultures and wanting to share that information with my blog readers. While I am sure that these questions would have very different answers if the respondent had began wearing a CI as a child, this is still one valid perspective ~ a place to start our investigation. At the conclusion of her answers to my questions is a link she provided to me to another story of an adult in a similar situation that was published in the Los Angeles Times. If you go to that story, you will also find links to other related stories on Deafness.
Thank you for your interest in our CI investigation and in this deaf project blog.

How would you describe what your ears hear?

·        My ears are completely deaf, but I hear with CI very comparable to the hearing people, except for the music and TV sounds, and few other small limitations

What is your basis for this description? ie. can you hear some sounds or voice without it or from one ear only? I noticed that not everyone with a cochlear uses two, some only use one. I wonder why.

·        I am deaf on both ears and hear absolutely nothing without my CI, I may feel some vibrations depending on how intense that sound may be.  I have only 1 CI on my left ear.  The reason for implanting 1 ear is because I was used to hearing out of my left ear, since I had 'some' hearing in my left and had 'none' hearing in my right ear

Can you please tell me a brief history of your hearing loss as well as of the affects of wearing a cochlear? *specific questions follow:

Was it placed at birth before speech developed or afterwards due to illness or accident (prelingually/postlingually)?

·        I was supposedly born hearing, but at the age of 2 my neck became stiff on right side and slowly started to lose hearing because of the nerve damage...at age 7.5 years old I was fitted for my first hearing aid, and heard with my hearing aid pretty well, again some limitations like loud places, far away people talking to me...

Do you speak clearly or do people have trouble understanding you?

·        I speak clear, however I do have very little Serbian accent and it's only noticed on harder words...

Do you remember the "therapy" you needed to use the cochlear?

·        What's therapy? I never needed one, I heard sounds very well from an instant when I got my CI.

What was that therapy like?

·        N/A

Were you able to keep up in school? fall behind? excel? feel like an outcast?

·        I was able to keep up in school with my hearing aid (ha), I had good grade.  When I moved to the United States at the age of 14, I had to learn English with my ha and that was very difficult, many words sounded exactly the same like pot & dot, unless used in a sentence... I overcame that and learned the language.  I did well in school even though I was in most ESL classes.  Went on to College and graduated with Bachelors Degree. 

·        Did I feel like an outcast? Many times and many different situations...

Did you have a choice in the use of a cochlear or did your parent(s) make the decision for you?

·        prior to suddenly losing all my hearing at the age of 25, I was already aware of CI's, so when doctors could not help me anymore, I went and researched all about CI and made the decision to go with Advanced Bionics in CA.

Do you know if the decision was influenced by doctors or if the decision was ever regretted by them?

·        It was my decision, I wanted to hear so bad, I didn't want to be 'deaf', my kids were so little and I could not hear them, I could not teach them how to say new words, my daughter was only 1 month old at that time and my son was only 19 months old at the time of me suddenly losing all my hearing

If you made the decision later in life, have you ever regretted it?

·        I absolutely have no regrets, I love my CI

Do you use ASL? Do you consider ASL your first language?

·        No, I do not use ASL, I've never learned it in either Serbian nor English.  I consider Serbian as my first spoken language, and English as my second language.  I do regret not having an opportunity to learn the sigh language in Serbian language.  When I moved here, I always had so much to do that ASL was never on my list because of my busy life.

Lastly, do you enjoy music with the cochlear implant?

·        I have to say I do enjoy music when I'm in the mood, LOL.  I do find some music do be actually annoying.  When I try to listen to the conversation with my family (for example) I cannot stand hearing music in the background as it takes it away for me to focus hearing what someone is trying to tell me, while most hearing people don't have to worry about that.

Hi Kelly,

Here's 2 more additional questions you asked me about... Please let me know if you have any other questions, I promise not to make you wait this long on the next question... I just got a brand new android phone with email loaded to it, so I will be responding much faster...

1. Do you identify with the Deaf community? Deaf culture? ie. consider yourself Deaf/attend Deaf events/films?

• ·        Sadly, no offense to anyone, but I do not associate with Deaf culture, I was raised in  hearing world, I heard well with ha, and I heard even better with my CI, so I was never part of Deaf culture, my parents raised me in a hearing world.  I do not attend any events for the Deaf....
• ·        I know of another family in our community where both mom and dad are deaf and use ASL, but their 3 boys are hearing, and I speak to them slowly so that they can lip read me and I can read their lips too and that's how they communicate with the hearing world.  They do not believe in CI's, and all of their 3 boys know ASL.

2. If you do consider ASL your first language, how many in your family learned ASL to better communicate with you?

• ·        Nobody in my family knows ASL, or even Serbian sign language, we all rely on speech and we all hear.  I consider myself hard of hearing, even though I know I'm legally Deaf....

Again, I can't thank you enough for allowing me to ask such personal questions of a stranger; but please know that my motives are pure and I will use any insight you give me to further my passion to work with the Deaf and Hard of Hearing in whatever direction God leads me.

Kelly

This is the link to the article in the Los Angeles Times:
http://articles.latimes.com/2000/feb/28/health/he-3373

The Challenge: to Learn ASL Later in Life...

Is it possible at my age? Ugh... even after getting a 4.0 on my Pledge of Allegiance; I am once again doubting my passion for ASL will ever be more than a passing fancy. The RT's are my stumbling blocks... who am I kidding? They are more like my Devil's Towers or Mt. Rushmore's... which are 2 of the dozens of translations I totally missed tonight. But seriously... it seems like you also have to be a wiz at Geography and know where all the Deaf institutions and popular vacations spots are, know how a car engine runs and what a corticosteriod is, in order to translate. I feel so totally lost and yet will probably pass ASL 6 with a decent grade overall. Is there any encouragement out there? I am going to look into summer jobs/volunteer opportunities to work with the Deaf community in any capacity. Do you know of any in the great Northwest? Hope your day was awesome!

Viral video of 2 year old hearing mom's voice for the first time, thanks to his Cochlear Implant.

http://shine.yahoo.com/parenting/cooper-hears-mom-8217-voice-first-time-viral-195100068.html

What are your thoughts and experiences about CI's? Different for children and adults? How?
Is deafness something to be fixed? Is it a handicap or more like an 'accent' or foreign language?
Is the surgical risk always worth it? Does CI therapy impede more natural learning?
Does the child still learn ASL? Will/should the parents learn ASL?
Will the child identify with both the Deaf culture and the Hearing culture? Neither?