- by Paul Saevig
Deaf and hard of hearing
people have unusually low self images. I've seen it
in almost every one of them I've ever met, and
you've seen it, too. They're not confident
people. They always seem to be dealing with serious
problems: depression, alcoholism, substance abuse,
failing relationships, unemployment, etc. The hard of
hearing person always seems to be in trouble. He acts
like someone who thinks he's stupid and incompetent.
Is it something in his
genes?
Are we constitutionally
weaker than normal-hearing people?
Of course not.
Then, what is it?
The main problem is that we get
walloped across the kisser a hundred times a day. But
each wallop is subtle. Each blow is unobtrusive, almost
concealed. There's never anything you can complain
about, or put your finger on.
My hearing aid dealer takes off my
hearing aid. "Wow, you've really got this one
cranked up!" he says, as if he's caught me
stealing pennies from orphans.
Bang. All of a sudden I'm
one-down. I was doing something wrong and I didn't
even know it.
The phone rings and I answer. I have to
make the caller repeat something he's saying six
times. And I still can't figure out what he means.
So he gets mad.
Bang. Right across the kisser.
I'm at a meeting at work and my
wristwatch alarm goes off, but I don't hear it.
First one person gives me a dirty look, then a second,
then a third and then a fourth. Finally I catch on when
they point at my wrist.
Bang. Bang. When people routinely get
angry with you and communicate that your behavior is
puzzling, you start wondering about yourself. It
can't just be them; it's got to be you they're right. You ARE strange. You ARE different.
I remember how much trouble I used to
get into in physical education when I was in high school,
because I couldn't wear my hearing aids outside for
sports. "Saevig," one coach said,
"you're an honor roll student, but when you
come out here to PE you turn your brain off."
Another coach wondered why I couldn't hear him as I
swam in the pool and he stood on the deck. "Are you
just clowning around, or can't you hear me?"
I can't hear you, coach.
All my family and friends have always
told me I'm "too sensitive about these
things." So I've been trying for 43 years to be
less sensitive, but it's not easy. I want people to
think I'm a good, intelligent, reasonable person. My
experience has proven many times that that's asking
too much. I guess I was born naive.
It helps to talk to other hard of
hearing people. Every one of us has a thousand stories of
how we got smacked across the kisser,. Maybe the trick of
survival is not letting yourself be surprised when it
happens the next time.
Because it will.
One coping mechanism I see some hard of
hearing people use is acting as if nothing's wrong.
A couple of you who use this mechanism are reading this
column right now. Nothing wrong, is there? It
doesn't hurt? Doesn't bother you? You
don't care?
I nominate these brave souls for the
John Wayne Blood -n- Guts Award. They can put the
trophy right next to their ulcer medicine.
Then there are the explainers. They
wear their tongues out explaining to normal hearing folks
about what a hearing loss is, how the hard of hearing
person should be spoken to, what he can and cannot hear,
ad nauseam.
All this explaining is done in the
mistaken belief that any of it makes a difference, the
mistaken belief that the normal hearing person will
remember for three minutes that someone is hard of
hearing.
The only way for a hearing impaired
person to get along with normal hearing people is to
choose to associate as much as possible with decent
people. The late Viennese psychiatrist Viktor Frank,
recalling a long life in which he survived Auschwitz and
Dachau concentration camps, finally concluded that there
were two kinds of people in the world. Not Jews and
non-Jews, not blacks and whites, not even men and women,
but simply people who were decent and people who were
not.
People who are decent treat hard of
hearing people decently, and as Ross Perot would say,"it's as simple as that." Decent people will stumble
from time to time, and say cruel things unintentionally,
or even lose their tempers, but their heart, as the
saying goes, will be in the right spot.
Always remember that we have PhD's
in understanding hearing losses. There's no mystery
to us. But to someone without a loss, the hard of hearing
person is puzzling. They honestly can't understand
us.
Now of course, that doesn't excuse
their cruelty and rudeness. That's why we should
associate as much as possible with decent people.
ABOUT THE
AUTHOR:
- Paul Saevig was born and bred
in Orange County, California. He has been a
professional writer for the past 20+ years, and
currently resides in Tustin, CA. He is working on
his fifth novel. He has a 95 dB loss in both
ears.
- He'll soon be an implant
candidate. This article appeared in "life
after deafness" February 1993.
