Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Down, girl!

It's rare that Calyssa encounters another deaf/HOH child outside of school. So, imagine my surprise when, upon boarding the whale watching charter in Depoe Bay, OR this past Saturday, she noticed that TWO of the (maybe) 10 other kids on the boat were wearing hearing aids!

Calyssa did not have her hearing aids in. They were safely locked in the console of the rental car. Being foot-in-mouth me, I spoke my thought
aloud almost before I'd formed it, and was heard by the mom of one of the girls, "Wow, you're brave!"

She immediately spun around and started in on me, "No, we don't keep them locked up! They're deaf, not freaks!"...or something like that.

I immediately raised a conciliatory hand and gestured towards Calyssa, "Hey, she's deaf, too. I just meant that it's brave to bring them aboard! I was too afraid that they'd end up getting wet so they're in the car."

Startled, she looked at Calyssa. "Really? She doesn't look deaf." (???? Neither did the girls with her, come to think of it...) "Does she sign?"

"Yes, though she usually prefers speech," I answered. "She's gaining fluency in both."

Soon her daughter and niece were happily signing away with Calyssa, but their mom avoided me the rest of the trip. It got me wondering...am I THAT
defensive? And THAT insensitive? (Joanna, I'm ignoring your answer... =])


3 comments:

  1. Seriously, those things are EXPENSIVE...why the heck would you risk them being eaten by the WHALE?

    Seems as if *someone* took the "High and Mighty" road to Special Needs parenting entirely too seriously.

    The rest of us are normal...right?

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  2. It sounds like that woman took her kids on that boat expecting someone to make a rude comment. SHE was being defensive.

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  3. Thanks, ladies! I guess I emphasized the wrong word towards the end; the point I meant to make was, I hope to God that I don't immediately come across as being as defensive about Calyssa's deafness as this woman does about her girls'. Yikes.

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