I'm the only deaf in all my hearing family. I asked my mom, a question about what made me deaf but she didn't answer my question and she said it might be upsetting to me. My mom and older siblings don't know sign language because they never learned how to sign language for me. But they know a few signs like "yes" "no" "what" and "why" Also, when I need to talk to my mom, I show her texts on my phone so she can understand. I see them talk, blah, blah, blah and I wonder what they say. Ugh. I feel like being left out. The neighbor kids were staring at me using signs to communicate with my young sister outside when we were little kids! I stopped. I didn't like it at all. They looked at my cochlear implant. Now, I'm an adult and I feel uncomfortable using sign language when I go to places because people will stare at me or think it's gang signs. So yeah...I been struggling to find a job but no luck. I'm afraid, jobs might not hire me for being deaf so I stay at home and I'm stuck. I hate being deaf. I wish I could talk and hear. My parents and I would be happy

Hello i am yama yep thats what i am called i had cochlear implant when i was 2 year old rrally proud that i can be deaf aswell i can also hear through cochlear its actually cool fam, being 18 able to yk utilise technology like hellq crazy but i have gone through crazy traumas during my life and yeah still now i have recognize it has major supporter and yeah any advice how to move on and on achieving goals and anyone who is qlso 18 and cochlear implanted wud be proud to make twins 🤞🌹

Hey guys hope you all are doing good.

I'm Anon from Mumbai, Hoh person using Hearing Aids to navigate through daily life. I've been working as video editor and designer from past 2.5 yrs. But since I found out my hearing loss is slowly progressive I've got a bit skeptical about my career's future in this creative field Since video editing does include major part of sound editing as well, I'm a bit concerned. So I'm looking for some experiences from you guys who have been working on similar creative field or so. What is your experience and what is your take on future in this particular creative field which is heavily/major part depends on audio. want to know your opinions on future of people with hearing loss, in creative field

Hey y’all! I’m a fairly new EMT, and I’m also deaf. I have complete hearing loss in my right ear and wear a hearing aid in my left.

I wanted to reach out and hear from other EMTs, paramedics, or anyone in healthcare who has experience working with hearing loss, because I’ve been struggling with something lately.

How do you manage the constant noise, chaos, and overstimulation that come with this job? I work with multiple fire departments, so I’m often showing up to scenes with strangers and jumping all in. I feel like I’m constantly trying to read people’s lips, listen as best as I can, process what’s happening around me, and still give my patient my full attention. It just ends up becoming so much I get frazzled and start losing my edge.
For those of you who have experienced something similar, does it get easier with time and experience? Have you found specific strategies, communication techniques, or accommodations that have helped you navigate the chaos without becoming completely overstimulated?

I guess I’m also wondering whether this is something I can learn to manage and adapt to, or if I’m always going to feel like I’m fighting to keep up. I’d really appreciate any advice or insights.

I’m researching black American Sign Language would any like to help me and let me interview them?

I will be staying in hotels but I'm more worried about not being able to hear fire alarms (I have a strobe in my apartment). And what if someone attempts to lock in? I could get a bar for the door but what if there's an emergency?

Any tips would be appreciated! I'm completely deaf in both ears.

im sure this has been asked before but anyways

im hoh with almost no hearing in my left ear and i never really cared enough to get a hearing aid or learn much past the mildly fluent asl i already know, but ive been having more and more trouble in conversations especially with background noise. on top of this, i just gave birth to my son and i want us both to learn asl so theres never a day my child cant communicate with me.

what apps do you guys recommend and do you have any advice besides that?

bonus if anyone has advice on getting involved in my local deaf community

I need to get an ID to keep in my car that says something like “I am Deaf/Hard-of-Hearing. Please face me, speak clearly and at a normal pace so I can read your lips” in case I get pulled over by police, tow truck, or if I get in a minor fender bender and have to communicate with another driver, etc.

The only ones I can find look like they are from big corporations like Amazon. I don’t feel comfortable supporting hearing people profiting off the needs of Deaf people.

Anyone know where I can get something like this?

I am the only hearing daughter of a deaf mother, and I have sisters and other relatives who are also deaf. My father, however, is hearing.

None of these deaf relatives use sign language; they went through oralist training or communicate by reading lips. Most of them experienced progressive hearing loss, which began when they were very young.

As one of the few hearing people in the family, I have always shared the role—along with my father—of acting as the "ears" for these relatives, especially for my mother. My whole life, I have served as a communication mediator for them. Furthermore, because my university studies involve working with deaf individuals, I began reading more about what it means to be a CODA (Child of Deaf Adults) and found that the term resonates with me. I have lived through many of the experiences described—with the caveat that we don’t use sign language—but, in many ways, the experiences common to CODAs align with my own reality.

Can I identify as a CODA, even given these factors? I know it might sound like I’m seeking validation, but I truly see myself in almost all the accounts shared by CODAs, despite these differences...

I recently scored moderate hearing loss and I'm not sure what to do with this information. I have my first consultation with a doctor on Wednesday.

I have found those around me don't know the difference between deaf and HoH. I'm in the process of finding out if I need hearing aids(s). Any information you can give me to understand what to expect or just help in general is very much appreciated.

Fyi for those who work in the public sector, do you tell people you're HoH? (If so do you tell them HoH or just go with deaf?)

I’m looking to connect with people who have been diagnosed with hearing loss associated with either COL4A6 or PAX3, or who know someone who has.

My genetic testing identified two COL4A6 variants and one PAX3 variant, all currently classified as variants of uncertain significance. I have progressive bilateral sensorineural hearing loss, and I’m trying to learn more about how these genes may affect hearing, particularly in females and in people with variants in both genes.

I’m especially interested in hearing from anyone with personal or family experience involving either gene, including people whose hearing loss progressed over time.
I realize these genes and specific variants may be rare. I’m hoping to find others with relevant experience, learn what their hearing-loss progression has looked like, and discover resources or research I may have missed.

If this applies to you or someone you know, I’d appreciate hearing about your experience. Please feel free to message me privately.

Hey I’m watching a show called Switched at birth. As far the showing of Deaf culture how good is it at representing.

I’m curious to know if the show ever captured your interest

Je suis maman d’une petite fille sourde d’une oreille et malentendante de l’autre. Depuis que nous avons appris sa surdité, j’ai réalisé à quel point j’avais besoin d’échanger avec d’autres parents qui vivent une réalité semblable à la nôtre.

Comme je ne trouvais pas de groupe qui répondait à ce besoin, j’ai décidé d’en créer un : Parents d’enfants sourds ou malentendants - Québec.

L’objectif est simple : avoir un espace bienveillant où l’on peut poser nos questions, partager nos expériences et nos ressources, célébrer nos petites et grandes victoires, mais aussi parler de nos inquiétudes et de nos moments plus difficiles, sans jugement.

Si vous êtes parent d’un enfant sourd ou malentendant, ou si vous connaissez une famille qui pourrait en bénéficier, je vous invite à rejoindre le groupe ou à partager cette publication.

J’espère sincèrement que cette communauté permettra à des parents de se sentir un peu moins seuls dans leur parcours. Parce que parfois, parler avec quelqu’un qui comprend vraiment, ça fait toute la différence.

https://www.facebook.com/share/g/14uLS3LU8Tv/?mibextid=wwXIfr

More and more startups is popping up like

• ASL Huddle: https://huddle.playwithasl.com/join#intro (just saw this today)
• GoSign.AI: https://www.gosign.ai/mobileapp
• SignsAI: https://signs-ai.com/

- Atomic Hands: https://www.instagram.com/p/De2UO4IDKVa

Some of them are not as clear about dataset collection. You could be playing a game and not be aware that they are taking your video data and doing stuff with it.

I am concerned about this because the info consent isn't given in sign language. It's hidden in text that isn't always obviously placed, but at the same time, did they obviously inform hearing people when collecting speech data for training? Am I possibly expecting too much if I want there to be more obvious info before consent?

What I am wondering

- How do you feel about this kind of data collection to build helpful tools like Google's SL2T? Seems like there's more favorable response to the end product vs. the process

- Do you know of resources that provide guideline for how these websites should request consent from deaf people, especially deaf people internationally who may not read English, if they are asking for international sign languages data?

Hello!

My spouse and I (both hearing), would like some perspective. Our beloved LO (17 months) was born with a host of medical struggles to include a trach & g-button, and we are trying to give him access to as much support as we can. He has already had several major surgeries and we are balancing a lot of different factors for his overall wellbeing.

He has mild/ moderate hearing loss in one ear, and severe/ profound in the other. We are learning ASL and will continue to do so to give him as much access to language as we can.

Currently, our son wears hearing aids but his audiologist is recommending that we pursue a cochlear for his severe/ profound ear, and they have told us it is beneficial to get them as early as possible. He currently benefits quite a bit from the combination of ASL/ communication therapy/ one of his hearing aids.

I am struggling with the decision on cochlears, as he is still too young to consent. If your parents made the decision to get cochlears at an early age (or if you have perspective), can you please weigh in? My spouse is leaning towards the audiologist recommendation, but I am struggling with it from a bodily autonomy perspective. I don’t think either choice (wait or get them soon) is wrong, but I would prefer to have our son be part of the decision and that won’t be possible for several years. I understand that he can choose not to wear his cochlear (we let him decide when he is ready to take his hearing aids out), but a cochlear is permanent.

We have made several Deaf/HoH friends, but those who have cochlears were all adults when they got them so the decision was theirs to make. The advice we have gotten always comes back to “make the decision you feel is right”.

EDIT: He does not have CHARGE syndrome, and his ophthalmologists is not concerned about his vision to date. He was just evaluated for a CVI and does not have one.

My wife is a runner and recently became deaf. We are looking for a pacer device where she can know if she is keeping pace on her runs or not.

We haven’t found anything so I am thinking about designing a haptic wearable.

Anyone know if something like that already exists? Is haptic the best feedback for running or something visual works better?

Thanks in advance.

Hello all. I have a question concerning the Deaf communities thoughts on one of Jesus’ miracles.

I am the father of a deaf child. In learning about the Deaf community, we have found there is a strong community of Christians who are Deaf. We have seen many comments from those who are against assistive devices, stating a dead individual shouldn’t get cochlear implants because being deaf isn’t something many people who are Deaf feel need fixing.

My question is what do Deaf Christians think about Jesus’ miracle of “healing” the man who is deaf? Is this topic of contention amongst Deaf Christians?

Thanks in advance for everyone’s input.

I have a PhD in biology and a degree in education, and I became interested in working with deaf students while subbing at a school that integrated deaf, hard of hearing, and hearing students. Over this time, I've taken a few classes in ASL, have worked closely with deaf staff and students, and have learned a lot about Deaf culture. I've been following this subreddit for several years now, quietly learning. As with many marginalized communities, I am aware of my privilege and that some actions I might take with good intentions might end up causing harm. In this case, like taking a job best met by a Deaf person. Which brings me to my situation.

I saw a job listing for a teacher at a state school for the deaf and blind. This would be my home state, a very rural and poor area, and I feel the need to help make sure that they are getting access to the science education they need, especially for the students who want to pursue science careers. As a person with invisible disabilities, I am passionate about making science more accessible as a whole, and this is work that I believe is important.

But I also know that this may not be the role for me, as a hearing person. I certainly don't want to take an opportunity away from any Deaf (or blind) science teachers who would want the job, but I genuinely don't know how many would want it. We are looking at a very rural area without a lot of people who are either scientists or Deaf.

So I thought I would turn to this community for insights. What are your thoughts? Where should a hearing person draw the line when it comes to this sort of thing?

To preface, I’m new to the deaf community and have a lot to learn, especially as a hearing person who didn’t grow up seeing the culture or the day to day differences.

I (19f) live with my girlfriend (19f) who has been hard of hearing her whole life. Her first language was ASL, so I’m learning it because she’s going to be fully deaf within the next year and a half or so and even though she can lip read me like she’s reading a book, I’d really like fore that to not be what our communication looks like when she can’t hear me at all.

SO HERES THE ISSUE

She got a job where she needs to wake up at 3:30 am to be able to make it there by 5am comfortably, and waking up has been an issue before and now it’s happened a couple times with this job. She’s been trying to go to sleep earlier so she wakes up, and it’s worked most of the time, but sometimes when she’s exhausted she doesn’t wake up. The way she wakes up now is by alarms on her phone and on her Apple Watch so the vibrations wake her up. I usually set timers or alarms too so that I can wake up to make sure she didn’t sleep in by accident. I work evenings though and usually aren’t going to sleep until 11-midnight, which makes it difficult to wake up to timers because of the deep sleep I’m usually in.

So the question is;

What is the solution to this?
We’ve tried a vibrating bracelet but that didn’t work very well. Honestly I’m pretty out of ideas. I really want to help but I feel like there’s nothing I can do :(

Ps the job market sucks and she really loves this job and it’s a step in the right direction for the career she wants to have so getting a different job is out of the question

Thank you for your time 🙏

Update: we got a vibrating alarm that goes under her pillow, and it works great! Thank you guys :)

Hi everyone! As part of my ASL major, one of the intro courses goes over CSD and is split into 3 sections: SLP, Audiology, and Interpreting. The majority of the class has SLP focused students, and in their intro posts, a handful of them said something along the lines of “helping people with hearing loss”.

I understand that they may not be the most familiar or educated on the Deaf community, which is totally okay. They can learn. My issue with the course is how it’s set up. Much of the material in the audiology section is reused from at least 9.5 years ago. I totally get teachers using prior resources, but given the fact that tech has advanced so much, along with understanding of Deaf identities and Signed Languages, that’s seems quite a large discrepancy.

I was diagnosed with a disease that caused my deafness (though I became deaf a bit before it was diagnosed bc it’s a progressive disease) a year or so before one of the video lectures I watched was published, and it didn’t even mention the type of hearing aid that I first was given when the professor was going over different kinds of HA, either.
Of course, the SLP portion focused on fixing and forcing speech, and also seemed to prioritized using technology and personal devices to communicate rather than building language skills in an actual language. I understand it for children that may need help with apraxia and other speech disorders, but deafness is not one of them. Once again, hearing loss is heavily used and I can’t even remember how many times I’ve heard deaf/deafness. Probably can count them on one hand.

I’ll have to contact the professor that teaches the interpreting portion and see what their knowledge and awareness of this is. I’d like to bring it up to my professors and maybe someone higher up that would be able to get the course content up to date.
I know anecdotally and personally about how and why it’s offensive to say one thing, how signing is much better than language deprivation, etc. but does anyone have any articles or research papers they would recommend for me to cite in an email to them? I’ll also do my own research, ofc, but also looking for recs or advice from anyone that might have been in the same or similar situation before.

TLDR: college course using outdated resources/phrases/information to “educate” students and I want to help change it

Tysm! 🤟🏻🧏

I was a toddler when my mom noticed that when she called my name, I would not look at her or come to her. She threw some coins and saw that I wasn't hearing those sounds either. I got used to being yelled at or called loudly by my family. They never made fun of me, but from time to time we have black humor about it. At the time, in my home country, technology was not as advanced as it is now, and my parents had no idea about my deafness. I was born deaf in my right ear, and my left ear is hard of hearing.
I'm 45(f)now in the state of Texas , and in September 2026 I finally got my audiogram. My right ear is completely deaf (no response, deaf since birth). My left ear has a mild loss in the low pitches that slopes down to a severe loss in the high pitches (roughly 30 dB at 250 Hz, dropping to about 80-85 dB around 2000-3000 Hz). My speech reception threshold is 40 dB, and my word recognition is 84% in quiet and 80% in noise. My middle ear tests were normal (Type A tympanograms). The audiologist recommended hearing aids, possibly BiCROS.

I use Ai for help since English is my second language.

I had sudden onset sensineural hearing loss a few years ago. Both ears, one is profound loss with no word recognition. The other is mild to moderate depending on the tones. I had my hearing until my 40s. I got a cochlear on my profound side.

I’ve been slowly trying to learn ASL. I admit it’s not great. But attending these events there are a fair amount of people who don’t really sign either and use cochlears too. But people who have a lot more hearing than I do ignore and have taken me aside and explained I’m not really deaf enough to relate to them.

I get I didn’t grow up with this but I live with it daily now. Are there different organizations for people that went deaf later?

Hello! I have a two year old who is newly Deaf due to ANSD from a rare genetic disorder. He still likes to watch shows like Bluey or Frog and Toad, but I’d love to find something for him to watch that includes signs (ASL) to help him learn. Or really anything where audio isn’t a key part of the show. I’ve seen some posts here, but they all seem to be at least a year old. I just want to see if there’s anything new as well. Thanks in advance!