The Abnormal Life of a Deaf Person

Kindergarten

2004-2005

This was a monumental change to my life. This was the year I began to be mainstreamed. No longer would I be with only deaf kids. I had shown so much progress than the others, so I was the only one who could be mainstreamed. I still had to have an interpreter with me, though, if I wanted to stay in the school. It was in my IEP. 

I liked just talking with people. I liked being independent, even as a 5 year old. I began to make friends outside of my deaf ones.I even got my first kiss/boyfriend in that class. I guess you could say that being mainstreamed in that particular class was a blessing (lol).

I found myself to really like math. Addition was the bomb! 

I did have to have an FM. It was like a little walkie talkie that would be around the teacher's shirt/neck, like microphones that you'd see on people on TV. It would connect with the part that I'd put on my implant. The two would connect only to each other and if there was a lot of excess noise in the room, the FM would help me to focus on only the teacher. 

I still wore my body worn processor, along with a hearing aid on my left ear to receive as much sound as possible so my ear drums wouldn't deteriorate more than they already were. If I only started hearing anything for the first time at this age, it wouldn't be as good and I'd be late learning language. 

It was in that school year that my cochlear wasn't working so we ordered in the Nucleus Freedom and swapped out the Body Worn. We had to go back to the hospital to get the Freedom programmed the same to the old one because it wasn't the program that caused me to not hear anything anymore, it was just the processor itself. We got the Freedom programmed the same and left quickly since we already knew what channels were good for me. 

At 5 years old, being deaf was a huge part of me. It was who I was and I proudly showed it off. 

My identity soon became questioned.