It’s heartbreaking to me, as a music lover, to have to tell my Deaf son, Alex, that there’s no use buying a music video featuring his favourite characters because he can’t hear it anyway. That’s not to say he doesn’t appreciate music in his own way. But my television and sound-system are incompatible, so there’s no way for him to feel the beat as he watches. The same goes for video games. Often they rely on sound. When he was very young, he would see his brothers dance to the music at the end of a movie. He began, then, to associate movie credits to music. To this day he still dances and “sings” (repetitive, monotoned, wordless chants) whenever he sees them.
Alex isn’t totally deaf. If I put headphones on him, he can hear at least a little, but he doesn’t like it. He has a fantastic sense of rhythm, as do many Deaf people – see the current “Dancing with the Stars” for evidence. But unless the music is cranked enough for him to sense it, one could say for the most part, he dances to the beat of his own drummer.
My A to Z theme concerns the joys and challenges of being the hearing mother of my Deaf son, Alex. To learn more about his beginnings in life, click here to go to my first A to Z entry.
As I’ve mentioned before, it wasn’t long (30 seconds?) after I found out that my baby, Alex, was deaf before I decided I’d need to learn American Sign Language, though I didn’t start taking classes until he reached the age of about two, if memory serves me right. I knew the alphabet and could count to twenty before I started, so I was ahead of the class in these things. The beginner’s class was basic – learn to spell our names, talk about our families, say where we lived, worked, and how we got there and back. Great stuff if you’re an adult. However, that wasn’t why I was going.
During the second level we learned, among other things, relationships, a few different objects, counting to one-hundred and beyond, and professions. So I was learning the sign for “secretary,” while what I really needed was the sign for “squirrel.” There is nothing on earth quite as frustrating as not being able to explain to your toddler what the simplest, most common things are. For instance:
“What’s that?”
“It’s a bird. Wait, let me look it up.”
(Three minutes later) “It was a bird.”
“What was?”
Obviously neither of us had that much of a vocabulary if we didn’t know what, or how to sign what, a bird was, but you get the idea.
Had I known about Baby Sign, I might have taken the classes. But I didn’t. If it was a “thing” in Ottawa in 2002, I didn’t know it. By the time I finally made it to a Baby Sign class, I was at Level 4 in ASL, and Alex knew all the signs they were teaching the parents. It was interesting though. I’ve heard it’s a wonderful tool for parents–if they’re able to teach it to their kids–to understand their baby’s needs before the child is able to form spoken words. I’d be interested to know if anyone out there used Baby Sign, and if so, how it worked out for you.
Why, if I wasn’t learning anything obviously useful, did I go all the way up to Level 4? Because they were teaching me to see. For three hours a week I had to communicate without using my voice. We sometimes played games where we had to get up in front of the class and fingerspell something, and then another of us had to write it on the board. Tests were signed to us and we had to write down our answers. It was crazy difficult, but it was fun. And it gave an appreciation of how focused a Deaf person must be to understand his or her own language. The Canadian Hearing Society had one program I would have liked to have tried, in which they deafened hearing people. Participants would go in first thing in the morning and have silicone put in their ears. Then they would go out into the community–coffee shops, restaurants, stores, services–with someone from CHS to help, and just survive for the day. The rules were no speaking, and no note writing. It was apparently a real eye-opener, so to speak.
Alex and I muddled through those early years of communicating. I felt lucky to have someone to ask questions of once a week if I was really stuck. Youtube wasn’t around until 2005, (yes, believe it or not we survived without Youtube once upon a time!) and typically, computers couldn’t handle the bandwidth of a video anyway, so I was stuck with books with awkward drawings if I had no human to help. There’s really nothing better than having a native speaker in any language to guide a new learner. I’ve watched hearing people who knew no sign try it for the first time – most will do it wrong when shown. As easy as it looks, it’s not.
My A to Z theme concerns the joys and challenges of being the hearing mother of my Deaf son, Alex. To learn more about his beginnings in life, click here to go to my first A to Z entry.
NOTE: Pingbacks are not working this week. If you’d like to participate in the prompt, please manually enter the link to your post in the comments below. Thanks for your patience.
Anyone who would like to participate, feel free to use the “One-Liner Wednesday” title in your post, and if you do, you can ping back here to help your blog get more exposure. To execute a ping back, just copy the URL in the address bar on this post, and paste it somewhere in the body of your post. Your link will show up in the comments below. Please ensure that the One-Liner Wednesday you’re pinging back to is this week’s! Otherwise, no one will likely see it but me.
As with Stream of Consciousness Saturday (SoCS), if you see a ping back from someone else in my comment section, click and have a read. It’s bound to be short and sweet.
Unlike SoCS, this is not a prompt so there’s no need to stick to the same “theme.”
The rules that I’ve made for myself (but don’t always follow) for “One-Liner Wednesday” are:
1. Make it one sentence.
2. Try to make it either funny or inspirational.
3. Use our unique tag #1linerWeds.
4. Add our new, very cool badge to your post for extra exposure!
I remember the first time someone called me using TTY plus Telephone Relay Service. The way it works is, the telephone company has a hearing interpreter with a TTY (teletype) device between the hearing person and the Deaf person. On the Deaf person’s end, they are either watching the interpreter sign on screen, or reading on the device. In between, the interpreter is listening and signing or typing, and on the hearing person’s end, he or she must speak and then say, “Go ahead,” when finished. It’s a complicated, and at first awkward, but effective method of communicating.
I also remember the first time I spoke to a Deaf person through an interpreter face-to-face. Again, awkward. First, I wasn’t sure where to look. When the Deaf person signed to me, I was able to watch and listen to the interpreter at the same time. But when I spoke, the Deaf person watched the interpreter. I wasn’t sure who I should be looking at. I’ve since gotten a bit more used to it. Second, I never know how fast to talk. I get caught up in watching the signs, and when I catch one I know, I realize how far behind the interpreter is, so I slow down. …or is he/she behind? There’s the backwards grammar to take into consideration too.
I didn’t have to deal with any of this until we moved to Ontario and Alex was enrolled in a Deaf school. Appalling anecdote, that was part of what actually led me to move:
It took about a year to finally have a speech and language pathologist visit Alex at school. It was a regular, English-speaking public school in the Province of Quebec. He had a wonderful EA working with him there, by the name of Lise. She was with him all the time. She spent her lunches tube feeding him and playing with him, and she actually came out of town to visit the Deaf school with me before we moved. Lise is hearing, however, and was at about the same level of American Sign Language I. We both knew it wasn’t enough for him to grow, so enter the speech therapist to advise on whether or not the school should fund an interpreter for him. The pathologist’s final assessment, after watching him in class a couple of times was that he couldn’t benefit from an interpreter, because at his current level of ASL, he wouldn’t understand the interpreter.
…
It’s like saying adults shouldn’t speak to hearing toddlers because they won’t understand anyway. How does one learn a language unless they are taught by someone who knows more, and is able to expand their vocabulary by example? And this from a woman whose job it was to teach language!
So we moved.
Since then, I’ve been muddling along, learning from what Alex brings home from school more than anything. We learned together, him by being exposed to ASL daily, and me from being exposed to my son. But we’re slowly getting back to needing an interpreter, and I don’t think it will be long before I have to have one at doctor’s appointments. He can now understand most things that are said in the adult world. At fifteen years of age he is still quite far behind mentally, but he’s a teenager. One of the most difficult things for me is knowing where his actual level of understanding lies. I have to rely on teachers for that. It’s like hosting a foreign student who I gave birth to, sometimes.
My A to Z theme concerns the joys and challenges of being the hearing mother of my Deaf son, Alex. To learn more about his beginnings in life, click here to go to my first A to Z entry.
An important announcement for everyone participating in Stream of Consciousness Saturday: There are no pingbacks! I have no idea what’s going on with WordPress – I’ve checked my account settings, and nothing has changed. I should be receiving your pingbacks, but I’m not.
Edit: Pingbacks are not working today! (Saturday, April 9/16) Please manually include your SoCS post link in the comments below.
Well, all is back to normal after your unfortunate scare of last Friday. Sorry, but I couldn’t resist. 😀 The internet won’t tell me when April Fools Day will fall on a Friday again, but I believe you’re safe for at least another five years. Just time enough for you to forget… 😉 Anywho, it’s time for your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt! I’m going to do my bit again to potentially help you out if you’re participating in the A to Z Challenge. Here’ your prompt:
Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “ha.” Use it as a word, or find a word that starts with those two letters. Enjoy!
After you’ve written your Saturday post tomorrow, please link it here at this week’s prompt page and check to make sure it’s here in the comments so others can find it and see your awesome Stream of Consciousness post. Anyone can join in!
To make your post more visible, use the SoCS badge! Just paste it in your Saturday post so people browsing the reader will immediately know your post is stream of consciousness and/or pin it as a widget to your site to show you’re a participant. Wear it with pride!!
Here are the rules:
1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing, (typos can be fixed) and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.
2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.
3. There will be a prompt every week. I will post the prompt here on my blog on Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The’,” or simply a single word to get your started.
4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours. Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top.
5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read everyone’s! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later, or go to the previous week, by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find right below the “Like” button on my post.
6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!
7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.
Joking! It’s Friday, April Fool’s Day and time for your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt! Since many of us have begun the AtoZ April Challenge, I thought for at least this weekend I’d make it potentially easy for those who haven’t already written tomorrow’s post. So your prompt for tomorrow is as follows:
Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “be.” Use it as is or at the beginning of the word you decide to base your post on. Enjoy!
After you’ve written your Saturday post tomorrow, please link it here at this week’s prompt page and check to make sure it’s here in the comments so others can find it and see your awesome Stream of Consciousness post. Anyone can join in!
To make your post more visible, use the SoCS badge! Just paste it in your Saturday post so people browsing the reader will immediately know your post is stream of consciousness and/or pin it as a widget to your site to show you’re a participant. Wear it with pride!!
Here are the rules:
1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing, (typos can be fixed) and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.
2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.
3. There will be a prompt every week. I will post the prompt here on my blog on Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The’,” or simply a single word to get your started.
4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours. Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top.
5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read everyone’s! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later, or go to the previous week, by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find right below the “Like” button on my post.
6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!
7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.
Yes, I know, I’m a week late. My excuse is that it’s taken me this long to a) decide on my theme, and b) decide whether or not to incorporate the same theme on both of my blogs. Being the glutton for punishment I am, I’ve made up my mind to flog myself participate in the challenge, using two completely different themes.
Here, on Life in Progress, my theme will be living with a Deaf child as a hearing parent. It’s a subject I’ve considered writing about in length for quite some time, with the goal of writing a book about it. I’m hoping this challenge will get me well on the road to where I want to go. Some entries may be heartbreaking, each will probably contain humour, but my ultimate plan is to make them entertaining and something anyone can relate to.
On my fiction blog, Inspiration in Progress, my theme will lean toward creative writing, and in particular, character types. It took me less than three minutes to come up with a title for each letter of the alphabet, so I took that as a good sign. Each post will include a scene or a story containing a character described by the title of the post. I’ll also include an explanation of how I came up with the inspiration for that character. I have listed my fiction blog as Adult Content (AC) on the sign-up list for the A-Z Challenge, but it is not my intention to write AC fiction. The thing is, I never know how the muse will strike me, nor what the outcome of my writing will be until it’s written. Thus, the AC categorization just in case.
There’s my big TA DA! for today. If the whole enterprise turns out to be too difficult, I’ll consider buying a flail for next year.
It was a question I and a few friends in high school used to like to ponder. It came up after an interesting discussion in one of my classes. We used to love to distract the teacher with such things – this particular discussion was about how you describe what is real, and how you prove it. One example was, if you’re talking on the phone with someone, how do you prove they’re real. You can’t see them. You can hear them, yes. But are they really there?
This makes actually far more sense now than ever before. What is “real” is far more a relevant question in light of the internet. We have Nigerian Prince-bots and people claiming to be someone they aren’t in order to lure people into bad situations every minute of every day. We can talk on the phone without being home: are we always honest about where we are? I’m not – at least not when my mother is on the other end of the line half the time. (Shhhh. Don’t tell her. I can’t edit.)
The wind. The wind is real. But it’s hard to describe.
It’s a scary world out there, and I believe it’s getting scarier. This reality changes our personal realities: or does it? If, when you were a child, you knew that nothing outside your front door could hurt you, and you walked freely, it meant that you were confident. If now you can’t step out the door without fearing your neighbours will assault you, it changes your level of confidence. Does your reality change your nature? Would it depend on how much time you spent in the wrong environment?
Is it really Friday today? Between the long weekend and yesterday’s snow day, my timing is all screwed up. Well, if it is Friday, then that means it’s time for your Stream of Consciousness Saturday prompt! They say spring is here, but that remains to be seen for many of us. I’m looking forward to sitting outside soon! Anyway, here’s your prompt:
Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “real.” Use it with a prefix and/or a suffix, or just as it is. Have fun!
After you’ve written your Saturday post tomorrow, please link it here at this week’s prompt page and check to make sure it’s here in the comments so others can find it and see your awesome Stream of Consciousness post. Anyone can join in!
To make your post more visible, use the SoCS badge! Just paste it in your Saturday post so people browsing the reader will immediately know your post is stream of consciousness and/or pin it as a widget to your site to show you’re a participant. Wear it with pride!!
Here are the rules:
1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing, (typos can be fixed) and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.
2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.
3. There will be a prompt every week. I will post the prompt here on my blog on Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The’,” or simply a single word to get your started.
4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours. Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top.
5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read everyone’s! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later, or go to the previous week, by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find right below the “Like” button on my post.
6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!
7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.
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