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| What I Tell My Friends | ||
I tell them it helps me hear and that I was born deaf. And I got a cochlear implant when I was three, and now I just got a second one after school was ending. I told them that it helps me hear. I can’t hear perfect. -Molly, 8 Sometimes kids ask, “Why do you have ear plugs in your ears?” Sometimes I’m tired of telling everyone so I tell my best friend to just tell them. She knows a lot about it because she’s my best friend. -Kayleigh, 7, wears hearing aids They are cochlear implants and I have two. I had my surgery over the summer. I was very brave -Sam, 6 What Are Those Green Things in Your Ear? “What are those green things on your ear?” I replied, “When I was born I was sick and my ears got hurt so I need to wear these to hear better.” Usually the kindergartners ask me that because anyone else in my grade already knows the answer -Chris, 10, wears hearing aids My Friends Ask Me "How Does It Work?" They ask me questions like “How does it work?” (meaning my cochlear implant). I reply, “I attach it with this magnet.” One time I did a speech. I did it with my speech therapist. It was like telling them what all these parts are: “This is the coil,” “This is the cord,” “This is where the sound comes from”… All that stuff. -Molly, 8 I tell them it’s something to help me hear and then they understand. -Elise, 8, referring to her cochlear implant I Remind Them That We Are All the Same We are all the same. We may have something different but we are the same. Do not judge anybody. Most people do not know that I have a cochlear implant. My sister or I would tell them that I have a hearing aid and I use it to hear. They would see me talking using sign language and then they would say, “I want to learn, tell me, tell me, tell me!” Then, I would teach them. -Cristina, 13 My Friends Want to Learn How to Sign Most of my friends love when I sign. They say to me, “Tell me how you sign that.” They are always trying to learn sign language. I have a whole bunch of friends. Some are deaf, hard of hearing, and normal hearing friends. Some tease me a little bit too. -Cristina, 13 There Are a Lot of Cool Things The cool thing is the technology that they are making for us! There is a sidekick. There is AIM. There is e-mail. These are easier rather than dialing and waiting and all that. There is better communication. It is cool to be able to use my signing to communicate and it’s cool to use my voice to communicate too. Signing is great and it’s cool! The other thing that’s cool is that if I don’t want to hear something that is really bothering me, like if my parent’s are yelling at me and I don’t want to listen to them, I can just turn off my hearing aids. -Trista, 13 |
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Hospital Boston Department of Psychiatry. All Rights Reserved. The information on this website should not be taken as medical advice, which can only be given to you by your personal health care professional. Updated: December 23, 2007 |
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