This is My Story

On April 2nd, 1998 I was born into this world, and my twin brother was born 5 minutes later.  My parents had no idea what they were in store for.  You would think twins would be crazy enough, but I failed my hearing test.  I was born deaf.  At first my mom was sad because she realized that I would never hear the birds sing or hear her say "I love you."  But then a lady named Becca Larson contacted my mom and introduced my parents to the deaf world.

My parents started attending the deaf church.  They started learning sign language so that they could communicate with me.  I started signing when I was 6 months old.

This is me signing "dad".  I signed it 
whenever he walked in the room.

Even though my parents were immersing themselves in deaf culture by attending the deaf church, they still wanted me to learn how to speak orally.  I started speech therapy when I was 9 months old.  I learned how to say "uh oh" and "ma ma" when I was around a year old.  The speech therapist talked to my parents about a cochlear implant.   They put off thinking about it because they heard a lot of negative things from the deaf culture.  But luckily my mom met several deaf kids with cochlear implants at speech therapy.  

My parents eventually started thinking about getting me one.  They received a lot of negative emails from deaf people at the church.  They told my parents things like, "You don't love your daughter the way she is," "You want to change her," "You think something is wrong with her."  They also told my parents to wait until I old enough and could make the decision myself.   My parents were torn because the audiologist told them if you don't get the implant early it wouldn't be effective.  They didn't know whether or not to get me a cochlear implant.  After a very hard decision they decided to get me a cochlear implant.  (thank goodness! ;) )

 October 27th, 1999 was a big day!  I was 18 months old when I went into a 3 hour surgery to get my cochlear implant.  My parents were absolutely nervous, but everything went fine.  When I woke up,  I was not happy.  

I continued with speech therapy after I got my implant.  Twice a week my mom and I went to auditory verbal training and I learned how to talk.  I actually consider one of my biggest achievements to be learning how to hear and talk.

The audiologists told my parents to stop signing with me because it wouldn't help me learn how to talk.  But my parents decided to keep signing with me because they didn't want to all of a sudden stop communicating.  I had a huge signing vocabulary, and my parents wanted to continue being part of the deaf community.  I grew up with both signing and talking.  One day when I was 5 my mom was signing and talking and I told her, "Why are you using your hands?  I can hear you."  My parents realized that they could stop signing.   My parents still sign when I have my implant off, but other than that we just talk.  

We continued going to the deaf church until I was 5 years old.  My mom decided it was best to leave because when the deaf people would sign to me,  I would respond by talking.  My mom would have to interpret for them.  My mom would tell me, "You can't talk to them, you need to sign."  I would respond with, "Why don't they just get a cochlear implant?"  Of course then the deaf people wanted to know what I said, but it was offensive so my mom would just laugh and make up some thing I said.  That's when we knew it was time to stop attending the deaf church.  

I went to the school for the deaf for preschool and kindergarten.  My twin brother came with me because they liked having a hearing person as an example.  When I was in first grade I went half day to a public school then the second half I went to the school for the deaf.  When I was in 2nd grade I went to a charter school, and I did great there.  The teacher wore a microphone and I had a speaker on my desk.

In 9th grade my twin brother and I switched to the public school.  I wanted a better transition into the huge high school.   I am now a senior in high school, and I am doing excellent!  I am a 4.0 GPA student.  I no longer have the teachers wear microphones.  As long as I sit in front of the classroom I do great.

I love my cochlear implant because it has changed my life.  I am able to do things I wouldn't be able to do if I didn't have my cochlear implant.  I have accomplishments but I also have struggles.  

I am deaf but with my cochlear implant I hear.

This is my story.