Growing up, my dad was hoh and worked for a time as a job coach at a place that specified in helping people in the Deaf community get jobs and make sure that they knew exactly what their job was and were set, before his boss decided to move the company to another city when I was around seven and just like that, my dad and I gradually stopped signing at home. Around the same time, I started school and had a really hard time with bullying from other students at the fact that my dad and I would sign and talk and I ended up feeling so angry/embarrassed that I stopped signing, and later as a teenager, I really regretted this and tried very hard to relearn how to sign. It wasn't really successful until a few years later when I met my current boyfriend at my (then) new job and rapidly learned asl (growing up, we signed see). Ever since then, I've been really in love with the Deaf community and Deaf culture, even if my job keeps me from attending too many Deaf events. Even though all of my young Deaf friends are from online, I'm friends with all of the d/Deaf customers at work who come in and actively search for me to gossip and ask where the hell they moved everything this week lol! I think it's really amazing how much I've embraced being a CODA, albeit a little late.
So imagine how excited I was when I found out a new special from A&E called Deaf Out Loud! I looked it up and watched the trailer and immediately recognised the family from ASL Nook!
The trailer said that the special would follow three Deaf families and would be an hour-long special; one family signed, one family spoke and signed and one family spoke, signed and read lips, and the thing I loved about the trailer apart from how awesome it all was, was how they were making it clear that every d/Deaf person is not the same. This myth is something that I hear all the time, and something that annoys me to no end, especially when people find out my dad is extremely hoh and has tinnitus and speaks and read lips, but my boyfriend only signs.
Near the end, Marlee Matlin said it best:
"The misconception lies in the fact that Deaf people all think alike, talk alike and live alike. And that's not true."Yesterday, it finally aired; my boyfriend had to work, but I was off and was able to watch it live and recorded it for him to watch on his day off 🤗🤗🤗
*Spoilers underneath*
Deaf Out Loud followed three families:
The Mansfield family, The Posner family and The Garcia family. The Mansfield family are all Deaf except for the youngest daughter, Ivy, and exclusively sign at home, The Posner family is Deaf and sign, speak and lip read and The Garcia family is both hearing and Deaf and speaks and signs.
For the Mansfield family, they talked about growing up being the only Deaf person in their families and the difficulties after they grew up and struggled to communicate with their families, and how the husband, Manny, didn't really start signing til he went to college and found how much easier it was for him to communicate. Their older daughter, Shaylee, was born Deaf and they joked that she hadn't failed her hearing test, but passed her Deaf test. Later, Ivy, the youngest daughter (who also thinks she's a unicorn 🦄🦄🦄) was born hearing and for the first month, they kept it a secret that she was hearing, because they were afraid of how their hearing families and friends would react, but also because they were afraid that they might not put the same amount of effort into their relationship with Shaylee since they could communicate with Ivy with speech. Another thing that showed was Ivy's birthday and expressed how they were nervous about if her starting kindergarten and being around hearing kids who probably only use english would affect her Deaf identity and signing. One thing that was obvious was how much they all love each other and care about each other 💟💟💟
The Posner family all wear hearing aids and use a mix of asl, speech and lipreading to communicate and one of the things I really liked was the really funny and blunt things mum Rachel would say! Both of their children are mainstreamed, but there was a problem with their son, Henry's hearing aid: it wasn't powerful enough anymore, and the new stronger one they got him wasn't strong enough either. So Henry had asked his parents if he could get a cochlear implant and they were trying to see if that was a possibility. They mentioned how getting a CI is seen as controversial in the Deaf community, but that they have to do what they feel is best for their kids, and also that Henry was personally asking for one, so how could they deny him one? So they took him to the audiologist, but it was obvious that he was having a lot of difficulties; after he had an MRI, it was time to sit down for the consultation to see if he was an eligible candidate. A little before, they took the kids to the pool and one of their Deaf friends asked how they felt about him possibly getting a CI and while Mick admitted that he had a lot of negative experiences from others when he had his CI and that that was why he ultimately decided to stop using it, they agreed that they would do whatever was best for Henry and their friend said that whatever they decided, she would support them. However, once they went to the consultation, they were met with a surprise: Henry could not get a CI, because he doesn't have a nerve connecting to his cochlea! While they were definitely surprised, they decided to just see what kind of hearing aids he could get to help him hear better.
The Garcia Family is made up of six kids, four are Deaf and two are hearing, and Paco, who's Deaf and his wife April, who's hearing and a CODA :) Paco and April live on a a big plot of land that they built as a foster home for deaf children who are normally overlooked when it comes to adoption. Four of their kids are adopted and they use both sign language and speech to communicate. I thought it was sweet when they talked about how they met and fell in love--Paco had hurt his arm and April was his interpreter, but mostly interpreted his body language and was a little rude, but regardless, Paco fell in love with her and they went out on a date. For their first date, they went dancing and Paco ended up being the better dancer and taught April how to do it, which was both a sweet and funny story! Their story was mostly about their second youngest son, Zade, and the problem with whether or not to move him to a Deaf school or keep him in a mainstream school. Zade was having problems with his hearing getting worse and no longer being able to use his hearing aid; he couldn't hear it anymore. His parents didn't want to force him to go to the Texas School of the Deaf, but at the same time, they wanted him to be able to fully understand what his teachers were saying in school. They decided to take him to the school to see how he liked it, and even though at first, he seemed a little nervous, he quickly was all smiles and decided he wanted to switch schools and take off his hearing aids.
The special ended with Paco telling Zade that while he'll probably lose his hearing, but that everything will be alright and he will always love him, and they hugged 💗💗💗 A perfect and touching ending to the best special that I'll never miss, in sha Allah 💗💗💗
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