"My Deaf Family" (and My Hearing Life)

I’m hearing impaired. I was born with a 60% hearing loss in my left ear and an 80% loss in my right ear. I have worn a hearing aid in my left ear since I was three years old and in my right ear sporadically. It’s hard to explain but wearing a hearing aid in the right ear doesn’t really help all that much. It sort of provides a surround-sound effect that is distracting, like background noise that doesn’t really add anything to my listening experience. For instance, when you’re talking with a friend in a café, do you want the radio turned up or down? It’s easier to hear your pal when the radio is turned down, right? Well, it is for me, anyways. Wearing the right hearing aid is a lot like that.

As a pre-schooler, I attended a special early childhood education program for deaf and hearing impaired kids in an elementary school across town. I don’t know if it was because we were in an early childhood program or if it was because we were special ed, but our little class was completely segregated from the rest of the school. I rarely ever saw any of the other kids. We didn’t eat together, play together, attend school-wide assemblies together, nada. Something about that experience felt inherently icky to me, even at the wee ages of 3, 4, 5 years old. When it came time to decide whether or not to continue on in the hearing impaired program for kindergarten and elementary school or be mainstreamed into the school two blocks from my house with my best friends from the neighborhood, I didn’t hesitate. I wanted to be “normal” and go to school with my friends and my sister at the “regular” school.

Once I started kindergarten, I stopped signing, like I had been in the hearing impaired program and I started living completely in the hearing world. The choice was mine. It was instinctual. With all due respect to the Deaf community, my six year-old self knew I had to learn how to “pass” as hearing in order to survive in this world. It hasn’t been easy and I have often felt like I haven’t belonged in either world, the hearing or the Deaf. I am not completely hearing and I don’t sign any more.

But I made my choice and I lived with it. There’s a lot I haven’t heard, a lot I’ve missed out on. When I go to weddings or parties, I hear almost nothing. Everything becomes white noise. I usually don’t hear things over a loudspeaker, especially if there’s background noise. (Dear airlines, subway operators and any other crowded places, this means you.) Auditoriums and convention centers usually have horrible acoustics, with a million places for microphone sound waves to bounce all over the place.

In other words, sigh. I do the best I can. My hearing aid is really pretty good but it will never make up for my hearing loss, not 100%. There have been times when I’ve wondered if I made the wrong choice. Should I have forsaken the hearing aids, kept signing and remained in the Deaf world? I watch people signing and am jealous. I wish I could sign. I wish I could belong to them, but I don’t.

Marlee Matlin’s new show, My Deaf Family, is a poignant reminder of that. The “Pilot” episode tells the story of the Firl family, narrated by eldest son Jared. His parents are Deaf, as are two of his siblings, Sabrina and Gideon, but Jared and his little brother Elijah are hearing.

The show is fascinating. I love watching the whole family signing. I love that their communication is not dependent on their ability to hear. I watched the show twice; once, with sound and once, without. I liked it better without sound. It felt more authentic. The audio version includes interpreter voiceovers for the parents’ interviews which was completely unnecessary. Subtitles-only would have been far more appropriate, in my opinion. It felt like the voiceovers were included for hearing listeners’ benefit and if they’re going to be immersed in the Deaf world, they should get the real deal. They don’t need any accommodation.

I loved that the family was shown being really normal: the kids played video games and basketball, they fought over cinnamon rolls, Jared got grounded for not doing his homework, and the mom ordered pizza.

I loved that Bridgetta, the mom, calls being Deaf “a gift”. I wish I had her grace. I have always been ashamed of my hearing loss. I have tried to hide it. It has been the bane of my existence. If I could get rid of my hearing aids and be able to hear normally, I probably would. (Maybe not. I don’t know.)

In any case, I really liked “My Deaf Family”. I hope there will be more episodes to come as I think this series has the potential to shed some light on what it is like to live with Deafness and hearing impairment.

If you haven’t watched “My Deaf Family” yet, check it out:

If you go to the YouTube site, you can watch the show with closed captioning. I definitely recommend that!

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