2001 NWSRD CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS

>> Hi everyone. I think it's time to start. Good morning. Yes, it is still morning. My name is Libby Stanley. I was born and raised here in Oregon, down in Salem. I'm a former student of the Oregon School for the Deaf. When I graduated from there, I went to Gallaudet University majoring in psychology and graduated, yikes, three years ago.

 I took a couple of years off to decide what I wanted to do with my life, and I decided to go ahead and pursue counseling, and so I'm a first year student now at Western Oregon University in the counseling program. Obviously I’d like to become a counselor in the future. But I'm not quite sure what kind of counseling I want to do. I'm sure it will involve HIV/AIDS consumers. I may work as a school counselor. I'm also working with people with domestic violence. I'm also interested in people going through alcohol and drug recovery. So I have got a lot of options. Right now I work for the Connection Program in Salem, and this is a counseling center that serves deaf and hard of hearing people. I will explain a little bit about that program later. In fact BJ will talk to you about that, but why doesn't she introduce herself first.

>> Hi. I'm BJ Crossland, and I'm from Missouri. I was born in Missouri. My father was in the military so we moved and lived in Washington State for a while -- lived on Vashon Island. Moved back to Missouri and graduated from high school. I had no idea what I wanted to do. I happened on some kids in the mainstream program, and I went with them -- spent two years providing transportation.

 I was 18. They were in seventh and eighth grade so I could drive them around. I provided transportation to them different places and they gave me the gift of sign. That's where I developed my sign language with those kids. I started doing interpreting after that. Back then they didn't have a lot of interpreter training programs so I had to go and learn more about the language, the grammar, the structure. But I did work as an interpreter for 16 years, and then I decided I was mature enough to go back to school. So I went back to school and got my bachelor's degree and then went to Western Oregon University and got my master's in rehabilitation counseling, and I graduated last year in June. I work at the Connection Program, and I coordinate that program. So that tells you a little bit about me

>> Before I start I realize I'm wearing a tan jacket against a tan background. Can you see me clearly? Thanks for letting me know. Now, before I start, I’d like to ask questions to find out who are the deaf people here? Who are hard of hearing people here? I assume the rest of the people are hearing. Is there anything else they could be? Who here works in the mental health system? As a counselor or whatever? School counseling, that's fine. Who works with VR? Okay. Some. Anything else? Who are the college students? Are there any teachers here? We have some college students, too. Okay. I was just wondering who all was here.

>> (audience member:) I want to use the interpreter. I am also here because I'm interested whether you guys contribute to Department Of Children And Family Services in their need to better serve kids who are deaf and hard of hearing.

>> Thank you. Good. And I know that mental health people work a lot with children and family issues. So I'm really glad you're here, and I'm familiar with those issues. Bj, do you want to go?

>> I'm going to quickly explain a little bit about our program, the Connection Program. We are under Northwest Human Services, which is a social service agency. We are one small program out of a big agency. We currently have five staff. Myself -- I'm the coordinator as well as the case manager and counselor, and Libby Stanley, who you have already met. We have Irmgard Friedburg. So do you want to stand for us? She is our psychologist. We just hired her. She has been working with us for about a month. And Coleen Thayer. She is our office technical support, whatever we need her to do person. We also have one other counselor who is unable to be here with us today. His name is Lee Pakes and he does counseling and case management. We provide counseling, case management, advocacy. We work with the Oregon School For The Deaf, with the kids they have there. We also work with family services, with the court systems, and whatever else comes our way actually. We have a lot of people coming requesting services, and we try to accommodate them the best way we can, finding them appropriate services or providing those services ourselves. So if you just look at the introduction, that gives us a little bit about us. The next two slides actually tells us about the Connection Program. We don't know how -- (laughter) Coleen has to teach us.

>> Sorry about that. I don't know much about the computer myself to do it now. Oh, well. Let me see if I can figure out how to go back. I got it. There we go. Is that it? You guys have a copy of it, too. We will then be talking about communication. We will identify four aspects of a deaf person's life, how childhood may affect people in adulthood. We will talk about conversational isolation, reexperiencing trauma, and then we will do a wrap-up. So Libby will begin by talking about communication.

>> I left a pile of handouts in the back of the room if you need one. One of the volunteers will give it to you. There are some more handouts here to my left. Got it? I do have a large-print copy if someone would like that. I do have more large-print copies if anyone needs them. Okay.

We are using the image of a puzzle today. Because we realize that every piece of that puzzle is important to a human being. And each of those pieces put together give us the big picture. And what we are going to do today is take the puzzle apart and look at each of the pieces and put them back together and create that big picture again later. Now, the first piece of the puzzle is communication. You already understand this, of course, but deaf people have many strategies for conversation, and some people may use one or two conversational strategies. Another might use many. One client may be particularly skilled in one communication method like speech reading -- but I want you to see all of the different strategies that our clients use.

We are looking at two types of families. Deaf children from families of deaf parents and deaf children whose parents can hear. When we are working with the client who has deaf parents, then we assume that there is whole and natural communication within that family, whichever communication strategy that family uses. But, when we are looking at a deaf child or a deaf adult who comes from a family with hearing parents, we may or may not have full communication. We sometimes see one or two people in the family who sign and communicate well. It could be a parent. It could be a sibling, or we have different family members with different skills communicating with the deaf client. Today we are going to focus our talk on communication issues for deaf people who grew up in hearing households. Because, of course, 90 percent of deaf people come from families with hearing parents. So today we won't focus on the deaf children of deaf parents, rather we will focus on deaf children who are in a hearing family.

 Now, I spoke briefly about communication. Don't believe I'm finished with communication, the discussion on communication. I'm going to leave it as a piece of the puzzle but I will continue to integrate it into my talk today. I want to move on to the home life of our deaf clients, and I’d like to have you all join me in the scenarios. Here is one: hearing family gathered together around the family maybe for a holiday, and there is one deaf child there. Tell me what you see happening in that scenario.

>> (audience member:) You say this person is isolated what do you mean if the people are signing.

>> Hold on a minute. We need to have an interpreter up here and indicate who is talking. Okay an audience member has a comment.

>> (the interpreter:) It's a deaf person who is commenting about the fact that there is really no regular communication happening in the family, and the deaf child is sitting there watching everybody else talk around him or her.

>> (the interpreter:) Another audience member, another deaf person has a comment, and that is that sometimes the deaf child may want to join in the conversation but is shut out by the other family members, and often the parent or the siblings will do that to the deaf child -- hold that for later. No, wait. We will talk about that later. And often deaf kids at a table will ask, what did my brother say? What did my mother say? What did dad say? And the answer often is: later. I'll explain that to you later.

>> (audience member:) Sometimes that deaf kid might have a sibling who is deaf, so they at least get to sit and talk just with a sister or brother, but they only talk with each other while they are at the table.

>> (audience member:) Saying that from my experience as a deaf child in a deaf family -- oh, I had a sister who could sign. I had a hearing family. I had a sister who could sign. She ended up being the interpreter for me at all of our family events at the dinner table. So she took that responsibility all the time

>> (audience member:) I myself am the parent of a deaf child, and in our family, as an interpreter myself -- becoming an interpreter because she is deaf -- I interpret and I do interpret most family gatherings, but brothers and sisters can sign a little bit, too.

>> (audience member:) Even if the family signs to some degree or one family member signs, the deaf child misses the incidental information. Somebody gets up and leaves the room. Everybody knows they are going to the kitchen or the bathroom except the deaf child.

>> Good. I like the discussions, an idea. You are exactly right. I'm from a hearing family, and I have some of these same experiences. I can remember coming together for holidays, and I remember greeting my parents, and seeing my aunts and be uncles and we talk about how much I've grown and they would ask me how school goes and I give them the thumbs up sign, and I chat for a few minutes. My mother would come around and interpret for maybe 10, 15 minutes. After that greeting I go sit in another room and read a book until it was time to eat. After dinner I come back out again just to say goodbye. How many of you have had that experience? And many of you in the audience are raising your hands. .

>> (audience member:) I play basketball. I didn't read books, but I can remember being outside playing basketball for two, three hours until my mother would call me in, it's time for dinner. I do that. I go back outside again and then somebody would come out and tell me to come inside say goodbye, but I spend my hours playing basketball.

>> (audience member:) Well, with my family, I remember for the greeting, we used a pad and pencil and all we did was say hello, hello, hello, hello, and pass the pad and pencil around the room so they could at least say hi to me.

>> (the interpreter:) And Libby, of course, asked whether or not that was conversational or was that in depth or just conversational.

>> (audience member:) Sometimes in my family we would have the deaf family members seated in one room and the hearing family members seated in another room each having their own conversations but there wasn't any crossover. There may be some crossover saying hi but definitely segregated.

>> (audience member:) I remember on holidays I would always join that deaf group I remember always having to go to these family events but if I had a choice, as Dana said, to go to another family where everyone was deaf or go to another event hosted by the hostess I would choose that one.

>> (the interpreter:) A deaf person is saying: I can remember sitting at the table with all the hearing relatives and somebody tells a joke and suddenly somebody at the table is telling a joke and everybody is laughing and I think -- great.

>> What about incidental learning? Traditionally people learn through incidental learning and I'm not talking about what they learn at school. I'm talking about what you see on an everyday basis, information you receive from your environment. So again looking at a deaf child in a hearing household, I think the kids do get some incidental learning through visual information, but it sure isn't access to full incidental learning. For example, in my household I remember my brother listening to my parents fighting and him telling me about it, explaining what was going on. So, again, I like to ask people where did you get incidental learning? I'm sorry. That was a statement. I think we get incidental learning from different places. Going back to my parents fighting, I can remember watching my brother's facial expression and body language and realizing how upset he was and I would ask him immediately what's going on, and he would say, "it's mom and dad again. They are fighting. They are at it again." then I can remember seeing mother walking down the hall looking at me with that strange expression telling me she'd tell me later and the thing I missed was everything my brother got through his ears, and he was actually getting more incidental than I was, then.

 I briefly mentioned before that families have different communication styles, and, again, sometimes moms -- well, actually moms tend to be the one person in the family who has the greatest skill with sign language but sometimes dad does but oftentimes you will see deaf kids that use their moms as interpreters, and it's very interesting to watch the kind of interaction that goes on in the family, depending upon their communication style.

 Okay. We work in a mental health setting. First I’d like to know for the deaf people here who grew up in hearing families, do you remember experiencing some great loss in your family or trauma, death, a huge illness, crisis, divorce? How did you find out about that? Were you just given surface information or did you really understand what was happening in depth? How did you get that information? I see one deaf person saying no all I ever got was superficial observations or descriptions of what happened.

>> (audience member:) I remember when my mother and father separated, and I remember that there were times that I didn't get the correct information about what was happening because my dad was my only avenue to talk about that separation.

>> So you really didn't understand clearly what was going on.

>> (audience member:) My father moved out but I never got a full explanation of why he did that.

>> (audience member:) I usually got surface information, and I never felt like I got the full picture, and I remember when we lost a family member, everyone was grieving, and I wasn't a part of that grieving process, and felt as though I couldn't even help my family members through that process because I didn't have the full picture.

>> (audience member:) I remember when someone died in our family. I was young. I was only seven, and I went to the funeral, but I remember not understanding a thing about what the funeral was for. It wasn't until later, maybe I was 13, 14 years old when I really finally understood the concept of death.

>> (the interpreter:) Libby is repeating to the audience that this person is talking about the fact that you really didn't understand the concept of death because nobody in the family took the time to explain it to you.

>> (audience member:) I was the last in a family of eight, and it was my mother who passed. Yes, it was my mother that had passed, and I felt -- I never really understood what it meant for someone to die.

>> You know this happens when you have gone to a funeral. Have any of you ever had an interpreter at a funeral when you were growing up for a family or relative? I am seeing never. No, they never hired an interpreter for a funeral when I was growing up. And what do you do? You sit there in the chapel, maybe somebody is signing on the side. Everybody is supposed to grieve. But your mother is grieving herself and she can't really do a good job of it. My first time with an interpreter myself was at my brother's graduation from college, and they hired an interpreter for it and I was absolutely shocked. I had never seen this before. I loved it. All my life I had been depending upon my mother as the interpreter, but all she did was give me short -- you know, summaries of what people were saying. This is the first time I experienced an entire ceremony, everything a to z through an interpreter. It was a thrilling experience.

 Now, I want to talk a little bit about all the devices the deaf people use. What is it TTY, flashing alarm clocks, help me out here, assistive listening devices. A lot of times people will have TTY and most hearing families don't have flashing lights on the doorbell or anything else. What deaf kids end up doing is end up watching family members or waiting for the bark or may look to the dog to see what's happening. But we tend to see that deaf kids in hearing families don't have a lot of ALDs, we know having those devices will help the deaf person feel more independent and feel more equal to other family members, but we just don't see it happening.

 Okay. Let's look at how the deaf kids in a hearing family acquire the values or the morals of the family. How many hearing parents teach those to their deaf kids in general? Asking for audience response.

>> (audience member:) Well, just from what I saw in the family, what I saw happening.

>> (audience member:) My family members would model for me.

>> (audience member:) My grandfather was a pastor, and, man, you would clearly -- he would gesture to me whether I was going to heaven or hell, and I tried to act like the best girl I could because he was serious.
 (laughter)

>> Related to that, I work with kids who go to church every Sunday with their families, but they don't understand the religion of the family because they sit there without an interpreter, whether it's Catholic, Jewish, Protestant, whatever. They sit there and count the stained glass windows or the tiles in the church to have something to do. Somebody nudges them tells them when to kneel. But a lot of them grow up not understanding the values of the religion. Repeating what one audience member said, is a lot of times you achieve your values through watching what's going on in the family, but I don't know that that's enough. I don't know that you really can get an in-depth understanding through that, and we certainly didn't understand our religions growing up. There are so many big pieces that are missing. Okay.

What about the issue of discipline versus overprotection. What does overprotection mean? This happens when a parent can't communicate well with a deaf child, and what they do is become over protective. They don't want the child to go outside. They want the child near at all times. They come and check on them to check to make sure they are all right. But they don't realize how self-sufficient the kids are. They won't let them go into their independence. I have an example from my family. 13, 14, something like that, I got a new bike, and I was so excited. I was going to take my bike around the block and my father told me I couldn't because it was too dangerous. Now, I was living in Corvallis, Oregon, at the time, which is a sweet, small town. It was during the daytime. I wanted to take the bike out. I wanted to go around the block, ride downtown. My father wouldn't let me. I remember being so angry and arguing my case to my mother. Now, my mother to convince my father -- what's interesting is my mother really did trust me in my independence because I was closer to her because of the communication relationship with her, and she was willing to intervene and let me be more independent. My dad -- I don't know if it was because I was a girl or what, but that's a real good example of over protectiveness. And parents really having to work to understand that their child is independent.

 Last -- I’d like to talk about major life transitions. What is this? Okay. From the audience I see graduation, divorce, going off to college, graduating from college. Making the transition from work to school, changing schools. Coming from the audience again, getting married. Having a baby. Moving, school, college, yes, good. And you know that from the time kids are little they feel those major life transitions. I mean, the first day of school in kindergarten is a major life transition for kids. Going to prom is a major life transition. Kids have these transitions, as well. Going from puberty is a huge life transition. That whole teenage time, oh, man, the world is a mess for teenagers. And again if the family doesn't communicate well with their deaf child how do they talk about those experiences, work them through. In puberty how do you make those kids understand that they are becoming a man or a woman and really going in depth with it what the parents tend to do is give them one or two quick sentences about the explanation and go on and the deaf kids go out somewhere to learn from a friend or a sister or depending upon someone else, finding someone who can communicate with them well enough to explain the issue.

 Okay. Are you okay with that part? Do you have any questions?

>> (audience member:) How do you encourage families to communicate better? I work with a lot of kids. They go to their residential school. The parents don't have the exposure. They don't understand. They go back. The kids are skilled, and the parents are not? How do you support? I agree family needs to communicate, but how? Dad is working, can't go ASL. Mom -- what's your suggestion?

>> I have seen that again and again and again. Maybe the family can work with a school counselor. Maybe they can get some feedback, because I can understand the concern the family is going through, the sense of failure that parents might feel. I think the parents need a lot of support and encouragement. Of course they can take ASL classes. I realize the time issue but I need to ask parents what their priorities are, is it their deaf child or their own lives? Okay. We are running out of time, but I do have one more comment from the audience. We only have 15 minutes left.

>> (audience member:) I remember we had a parent Saturday at the school from the deaf, and we had a time when parents would come and ask questions and learn their sign language on that parents' Saturday.

>> Okay. We are going to continue this same exploration and looking at the school systems and what it might be like for a deaf individual in a mainstream school program and what it might be like for them in a residential school program. First let's look at a residential school program. What would their interaction be like with their peers? Any ideas? You guys know from your own experience.

>> (audience member:) They can communicate with their peers.

>> (audience member:) We have full access with the school for the deaf

>> Full access to be able to communicate with their peers on the same level as anybody else. What about in a mainstream program? What would the interaction be like? Anybody here go to a mainstream school program?

>> (audience member:) I'm a teacher at a mainstream program, and I -- one of my most -- one of the most difficult things is not only the fact that they can't communicate with the kids out in the mainstream but also the fact that I have such a limited number of kids that are deaf, and those are their only friends or interpreters or myself as the teacher, and they don't -- they can't hang out with kids. They can't get the normal interactions that kids have. They are always with adults or two or three of their friends, and it's just so frustrating.

>> (audience member:) My observation in a mainstream program has been that even if the teachers support ASL and sign ASL and use it in their classrooms, when they talk to each other, they are hearing teachers, they use English. So, again, the children miss that information that hearing kids get from listening to their teachers and overhearing. They miss all of that.
 

>> Someone else?

>> (audience member:) I grew up in a main stream setting. I had an interpreter at first, and then my next experience was with after-school activities, and I had to have an interpreter for that.

>> I have heard that a lot. I heard of a lot of deaf kids who grew up in the mainstream school program said the person they connected with was their interpreter. They had a few friends who could sign some, and they could communicate but it wasn't like a best friend relationship. They kind of built those relationships with the interpreters. So, again, what about the interaction with the teachers? If you look at the residential school program, is there any problem with the deaf children communicating with their teachers? And then if you look at the mainstream school program, are the children able to communicate one on one with their teachers? They will often have to use an interpreter in order to communicate with their teachers? Let's look at the involvement of parents in the school systems. If kids are going to a residential school. Parents may live down in southern Oregon. How much involvement will parents have in the school system? So let me ask you -- those individuals who went to the mainstream school system, were your parents involved in the school? Did they come to the sporting events, to the plays?

>> (audience member:) Sometimes.

>> Okay. Then let's look at the mainstream school program. The kids are going to school in their hometown. Do parents tend to be more involved because the school is right there and they can interact with the same school and teachers in their same town?

>> (audience member:) I’d say one issue with that, though, is because we have main stream school, all of the kids -- it's a magnet so a lot of the parents live far away. They have the same issue with WSD so they don't end up doing after school activities or the parents don't come or the parents don't sign or are connected with the kids and it's like, oh, that's nice you are doing that, whatever

>> So there are still some parents that are not able to attend because of distance or because they don't want to be involved. I'm sure that happens, too.

 so if you have a child that's in a residential school program and they see their parents on the weekends. What do you think their interaction will be with the family? What do they miss during the week while they are gone at school? What did you guys miss? What went on in the family that you found out later that you missed?

>> (audience member:) I think if perhaps in mainstream settings you see the family more often but there wouldn't be much interaction because perhaps the family wouldn't sign or just the mother, while in the school for the deaf you have your dorm family where you have a lot of interaction and communication. So maybe there is pros and cons to both, I don't know.

>> How did it affect your relationship with your parents, being away from them a lot?

>> (audience member:) I can't say. I grew up with my family. So -- how about you?

>> (audience member:) I grew up with my family, as well. I grew up with a deaf family, as well.

>> (audience member:) An example that I had -- I grew up in a hearing family. I went to the school for the deaf, and one thing that was very confusing to me was the rules. At deaf school there were particular rules you had to follow and when I got home my mother -- I would get in trouble for not following the rules at home. And I think a lot of deaf kids have had that experience of having to abide by different rules.

>> (audience member:) Another problem is -- excuse me -- often the deaf students would go to the school for the deaf, and they would learn different values and culture than their family of origin had, whether it was a different religion -- the moral codes at the school and home are both different. Perhaps the rules would be more strict at home or strict at school. So it just really varied, and there was very little consistency.

>> (audience member:) As a parent of a deaf child, I always felt like the -- it was always difficult for me to make a decision because it was always a trade-off. Do I keep my child at home so she grows up with the family values or do I send her away to school so she grows up with socialization. Both places she is going to learn academically. It is the most difficult thing for us as a family. My daughter went to the mainstream she grew up with SEE. In many of the mainstreams you see many of the parents signing a lot with the SEE. As she transitions to middle she started using ASL more and then transferred to the state school and then her youngest sister she felt she didn't grow up with her, you know what I mean? It's a trade-off. We need to have it all. That's it. We said it.

>> Very good, and my point wasn't to compare which school was best but to look at what would the experience be like for a child in the residential school and the mainstream school. What would the experiences be like to find out how those affect them in both schools.

Again we have already talked about this, the extracurricular activities, and somebody said that was difficult for them in the mainstream program. It was more difficult for them to be involved in those activities whereas the school for the deaf they had that ability to be involved in any activity that was involved. We are running out of time so we are going to go through this a little quicker now.

>> Let's look at another piece of the puzzle, socialization. . I'm looking at three areas here. And, again, looking at mainstream settings and the school for the deaf. Again, we are not in to comparison but are the experiences the same. Let's look at peer interaction are they the same in the deaf school or the mainstream? The answer from the audience is 24/7 you can communicate. Mainstream is less, you end up with one or two good friends you can communicate with. You talk to those people at break or lunch, but you don't have anybody else. How about activities? At the deaf school versus mainstreaming? Okay. Imagine that a group of kids have been assigned to a group project. How is that going to look at the deaf school and at a mainstream school in terms of the deaf child participating and communicating fully in that project? Well, we see that some deaf kids can be assertive and can be highly involved in projects in a mainstream setting using the interpreter. But that's more rare. We tend to see people feeling like they have more communication at the deaf school.

>> (audience member:) Talking about group projects for a moment, in mainstream schools, I think it really depends upon at what level the kids are at. It's very hard to teach that, you know. There is such a variety of skill levels represented.

>> (audience member:) I had a very similar experience at the college level I had gone to the school for the deaf and I went to a mainstream college. I can draw some parallels for group projects we didn't have an interpreter schedule a time you couldn't casually get all together it was such a hassle to get the interpreter make an appointment get together. At the deaf school it was easy we could all get together any time we wanted to and work it out. That was the big difference between the two settings.

>> I think that's right. I understand that experience. I remember -- now I can see myself comparing Gallaudet and Western Oregon. Again, not comparing, but it's the different experiences, and at Western Oregon University of course I have to start getting interpreters. I have got to keep a real tight schedule. You have to figure out if I can go to class or not if they switch interpreters on me. I know exactly what you mean.

>> Because we only have a few minutes left we want to get to the application part of this. Looking at those things that the -- the pieces of the puzzle what it was like at home. What communication style was used, what it was like for them in school? All of those will affect them as adults, effect affect them as individuals and how they respond to their environment. How do they learn what resources are available to them if they are in one school system. If they are in the mainstream school system or the deaf school. Where do they learn where the resources are? Where do they learn where the deaf community is. How do they learn to be independent? Is there dependency that's taught. Is passivity taught. Aggressive -- I'm going through this really fast but I want to get to the application part. Conversational isolation trauma, and Libby is going to talk about that, and reexperiencing trauma.

>> Has anyone heard about the idea of conversational isolation trauma? It's a new term. And I just started reading about it this last term in my classroom. But I think many of us here don't realize it, but we've experienced it. Some trauma event happens, and there are three kinds. The first one is event that happens outside the range of someone's norm, everyday activities and their experience. The second event exceeds the individuals' coping abilities, and the person feels as though they are overwhelmed with that event, and the last one is an event that affects my psychological capability and my psychological functioning so those are the three kinds of trauma I'm focusing on today. If we apply this to conversational isolation trauma -- let's see if this applies or not.

 Okay. So this isolation means that someone is not included in conversation. Not included in the interaction. Do you think this happens with deaf kids? You bet. How about the examples, a, b, or c? Do things happen to deaf kids that don't feel normal for them or feel like they are outside of their everyday experience? Okay. I think they do, and I do believe that deaf children, myself included have had events that happened and I felt as though I couldn't cope with it, and, surely I am influenced in my psychological functioning, and I think deaf people have felt that. They have felt depressed, saddened, angered. Some people like to act out. This trauma may show in their behavior. So that's the only thing about conversational isolation trauma.

 This book "culturally affirmative psychotherapy" is a real good book. I studied this last term, by Glickman and Harvey: looking at trauma again. You all know what trauma means. But sometimes what happens is I'll experience a trauma today that sets me right back into a trauma that happened sometime in my past. Call that reexperiencing trauma, an event that really puts us back in our past, something that happens to us when we were young.

 There is a story in the book, and it was a great example of reexperiencing trauma. When Sue was 30 or 40 she was working in a factory, everyday job, in the midst of a hearing world of people. She lives alone, and as things came up around her she didn't pay much attention to them. But one time the boss called a staff meeting. Now, Sue wondered about the purpose of this because they had never had one before but of course she joined the other staff at the meeting, and, again, of course, there was no interpreter there. So they had the staff all sitting around this room, talking, laughing, joking, talking to each other, and suddenly Sue started to look around the room at these people, and she started to feel funny. Her anxiety started to flare up. She was watching these mouths, and she was looking at one person to the other and her anxiety continued to grow. Suddenly she began to get angry. When the meeting was over she felt so bad she felt it was time for her to go see a therapist and she started to tell the story about what happened at the staff meeting and about how bad she felt about it, and the therapist asked her, "Was there another experience in your life in which this same thing happened?" and Sue said, yes. I can remember it happening at my family table with my brothers and my sisters talking about what happened at school. A father with a heavy moustache who was hard to lip read. I remember the same thing. All the same activity. Mouths moving. People talking, laughing. I felt lost again. That same anxiety. I felt the same anger and I wanted to repress that anger and keep it inside until suddenly at this staff meeting when she was in her 30s or 40s, finally could go ahead. And that's what I mean about the issues of reexperiencing trauma. Can any of you relate to that? I'm seeing some heads nod, and I surely can, too. Okay. Seven minutes left. Should we stop? Should we keep going? It's 11:45. We can go until 12:00. Okay. Good.

>> Now, we want to give you an opportunity to look at an example of an individual's experience and maybe look at what trauma you think might have -- they have experienced in the past that was recurring to them in the future. So in this situation, a 30-year-old deaf man was attending a class that requires a lot of small group work. An interpreter is provided for the group. Information about turn taking was identified. Group members have been respectful of this. However, the deaf person is having a difficult time getting to participate. He begins to talk only to discover someone else has already started talking. He waits, but by the time he would be able to make his statement, the subject has changed. He feels frustrated and angry. When he is confronted by the group members about his anger, he blows up and walks out of the classroom. Do you guys experience that? (laughter)

>> (audience member:) Too many times to mention. Many, many, many times. A plethora of times.

>> Can you see any connection to this person, where this might have happened the very first time in your life? Any ideas? What might have been their first experience in this occurring?

>> (audience member:) Dinner table.

>> Okay. At the dinner table. Maybe at a family function where family members are all together and people are laughing, and maybe they want to say something but by the time they get to say something, then the subject has changed. So it could have happened in their family. It could have happened in school. And this is something that keeps recurring over and over and over.

>> (audience member:) I'm a deaf person, and I went to the school for the deaf. But for me it was really culture shock because I moved to a town that had very limited knowledge of deaf people, and, for example, during a staff meeting all of the staff knew that for example I was deaf, and they would try their best, but I still felt frustrated about trying to get a point across just like this fellow in the example. So I think that was part of my experience at the school for the deaf where we didn't have those problems

>> (audience member:) I see it often in the hearing schools because often the, interpreter is trying to get off their hands what hearing children are saying in the discussion and negotiating that time of attending to the deaf students to their turn and advocating that I don't know how to say, oh, call on Johnny please he wants to say something while we are on this topic, and that the cultural mediation part is really difficult for on the fly interpreting information of class. So those kids miss their turn again and again. Very frustrating.

>> We have another example. A deaf woman 25 years old is working as a data entry operator. Her work has been steady. She is the only deaf employee. Interpreters are not provided for meetings because of budget. During the meeting a co-worker writes out things that people talk about. She doesn't want to complain because she fears if she does it could affect her job. She states that she really likes her job, but one day she up and quits, and no one knows why. What do you think she is experiencing? Do you think this is the first time this happened?

>> (audience member:) Obviously this deaf person doesn't know her rights to an interpreter and she just waited until she was fed up and quit.

>> Were there other hands up here?

>> (audience member:) One day she got up and quit. I'm sure it was because of all of her experiences that she had had in the past. She just felt like something was really missing and said, "That's it. I'm out of here." and I think that was based on her past experience.

>> Thank you. We have one more: we have a 21-year-old deaf college sophomore. He states he does not want to be in any of the classes with other deaf students. He states he hates deaf people and does not want to associate with deaf people. He states that he is deaf, but he prefers to live as a hearing person. He only socializes with hearing people. He wants the benefit of interpreters and ALDs, but he does not want to accept the culture of the deaf. What do you think he is experiencing?

>> (audience member:) He has not accepted himself as a deaf person.

>> Any other comments?

>> (audience member:) He is ashamed, embarrassed about being deaf.

>> Where do you think he learned that? Where did he learn to be ashamed of being deaf?

>> (audience member:) The person who was oppressed becomes the oppressor. Do you see what I mean? He is copying the behavior of hearing people and internalizing that.

>> He somehow believes hearing culture is better.

>> (audience member:) It was learned from his parents, I think.

>> (audience member:) Often I see that type of situation with deaf students who grew up in an oral communication setting and they turn out this way. That's just what I've seen.

>> There is another comment here.

>> (audience member:) Parents who implant the children refuse to sign. I see this kind of situation often.

>> As you said, from the parents, or from what other staff people tell them. If they say oh, you are smart you are not stupid like deaf people. Hearing is good. Deaf is bad. So the person will be accept themselves as a culturally deaf person, and I think it's a combination of those influences.

>> (audience member:) Maybe he had a bad experience within the deaf culture perhaps.

>> I hear a lot of students who start out in a mainstream program, transfer into the school for the deaf. Because their signing isn't the same they might get picked on at first because they are signing in SEE 2 instead of ASL, and some of those individuals still experience that over and over again. Any more comments related to that?

>> I’d like to add something to what the woman said in the back of the room. . About having a bad experience in the deaf community or with deaf culture, I have seen this in my clients. I will have kids who come to me who hate the Oregon School for the Deaf because of that experience. They are coming on campus signing differently or looking differently, communicating differently, and because of that experience they don't want to be in that community, involved in that culture. They don't want to see deaf adults, et cetera. I have seen clients who feel that way.

>> (audience member:) Regarding this person, I think there is a parallel with other minority group members, for example, African Americans trying to pass as white, straightening their hair, using Porcelana to lighten their skin. This is prevalent in American society that people want to aspire to be your everyday normal white hearing person because they feel rejected from their own specific minority group, and they feel bad because of who they are

>> You know, as I wrote this speech it kind of depressed me, because these are such everyday common experiences, and I don't want you to leave feeling this way. So I think we always have to think about what do we do to solve this? We have here good role models. We have educators, counselors, teachers here. What do we do to fight this? Let me give you an example. What about the parents who don't understand their deaf child who signs ASL fluently? They are trying to learn sign. They are trying to pick it up. They really want to talk with their child, but they are frustrated and lost because they can't. There is a comment from the audience.

>> (audience member:) I would encourage the parents to provide support for them.

>> (audience member:) Perhaps a support group for the parents?

>> (audience member:) I have a comment not so much about the parents but education and understanding go along way. I mean in counseling in talking about what's bringing on this kind of frustration, and by knowing what's causing it, oftentimes that can resolve some of the problems, I think certainly. I think ongoing counseling is important, but understanding where it's coming from can help resolve some of it.

>> (audience member:) I work as a school counselor at the Washington School for the Deaf. I need to empower the children to let them know what their rights are. For example, there is no communication at the family, then ask the parents to get an interpreter or learn sign language or a variety of strategies. We want to ensure that they are not in a position to later have a lot of anger about the lack of communication.

>> (audience member:) Often here parents with deaf children they find out that the baby is deaf, and they just want to be told what is the right thing to do? They don't want to hear that you are a bad parent. What they want to hear is -- they want to be told something that will make them feel good. My child is different. I want my child to love me. They don't want their child to reject them. That's the worst thing that can happen to them as a parent. So parents are willing to do a lot, whatever it takes when they want their child to be -- we need to educate the parents about how they can feel a better connection with their child. They just want to be told that they are doing the right thing. It's so important for parents.

>> (audience member:) What really helped me was parent groups, and the schools would bring in people for lectures and information and laws, and they just felt like we were empowered. It was really helpful to us so we could help our children, because we don't know, and the worst and scariest thing is I know once you learn and you go through it, you see it works, and you love your children. I mean there is nothing -- so that really helped was the parent groups.

>> (audience member:) I’d like to add to just what you just said. It's not only the parents, teachers, VR counselors, everybody needs to be educated about all the variety of things, what sign language means will cause problems in the future. There is so much controversy. They need to be educated about all the different things. I think that will really help them to have a variety of perspectives.

>> (audience member:) To add to what people have said the support groups are very important and other people who work with deaf people, and at the same time the parents must listen to what the child has to say. For example, there is an ASL class on Saturdays. I think that the kids would just be thrilled. That would be terrific so they could have communication access. So I think support group as well as the parents making a decision what to do with their child, of course. Do you want us to sign? And if the child says yes, the wishes need to be honored.

>> (audience member:) I’d like to add to his comment, education, VR, the entire human service profession is important. We need to have communication with parents as well as siblings. For example, my mother is a good signer. But I was not able to have a really in depth conversation with my father. I could bring in a friend to act as interpreter so if I wanted to have an in-depth discussion with my dad. And my father felt at a loss. We tried to find different ways to do it. One time my friend said why don't you sit and type on the computer. So my father did that. For example, do you want a beer? A soda? So we bonded that way. He is a computer maniac so we used something he felt comfortable with to go ahead and have in-depth discussions.

>> It's almost noon, but I really like the way you have talked about needing to work this out between parents and kids, and I agree with you. We need to educate everyone. VR counselors, other counselors, case managers, educators, et cetera. We need to understand that that experience, the child's experience. And like you were saying to the deaf child, tell me about your culture, tell me about your language, about who you are.

 I think parents really need to -- as well as understand the life experiences of that child -- you need to understand that these kids might experience trauma, and parents can work to discuss experiences that they have, try to bring out what's happening with the child. They may need to refer the child to the appropriate place or the appropriate service provider. They may need to come into the deaf community, receive some counseling, meet some role models, work with the mental health professionals at VR. That's all. It's noon. I will wrap up on the story. Yesterday I went to the Native American workshop and they were talking about deaf, native, and hard of hearing people, and it was fascinating to see how many similarities they had that Native Americans too felt oppressed, isolated, not included in communication. I was in there thinking Native Americans and I have so much in common in terms of this communication isolation. So I feel, again, we have bonded again in a new way, Native American, deaf, and hard of hearing community. I know it's time for lunch. I will be available for questions. Feel free to come up and talk to us. (applause)
 

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Last modified on 09AUG01