(Ch. 45 of my storyblog of my journey into Deafhood…)

My mother is truly the wind beneath my wings. She knew how hard it had been for me after I lost my hearing. She listened to my woes daily. In between college semesters, Mama decided to ask me to join her at a statewide Religious Education Conference in LA. The Catholic Church holds this grand, annual, weekend event to inspire, educate, and guide religious education volunteers and staff. My mother had been teaching CCD (Catholic religious education) classes for a year and thought it might be a good idea to get me involved as well. She knew my spirit needed tending. I accepted her invitation mostly because I was so hungry to be a part of a group again.

We rode a bus with other parish volunteers and stayed at a hotel right across the street from Disneyland. It was a good time for me to join this group. The people I was around seemed welcoming and my heart was open. I chose my workshops carefully, making sure I joined classes that would meet my visual needs for communication and anything that might address issues of hearing loss. Like I did with my college classes, I showed up really early to each workshop so I could guarantee a front row seat. I did not know sign language well enough yet to use an interpreter. I still relied on lip-reading.

The workshops and seminars seemed wonderful, and I could tell the speakers were quite inspiring by the looks on the faces of those attending the classes with me. But for me, it was all pretty fuzzy. However, I remember one presentation in particular that really moved me even though I could not hear it at all. It was from a woman who told the story of Mary, the Magdalene, while acting as Mary Magdalene herself. Lip-reading her was a struggle, as she was higher up on a stage and off to the side. Yet, her performance and rendition of this female disciple was very visual and full of movement and expression.

I strangely felt I understood parts of her message, even though I couldn’t hear her. I could see this woman dramatically transform, and my spirit hungered for more. It was the first time I realized I was listening deeply with my other senses. It was as if I had developed a sixth sense. I was listening with the ear of my heart (a phrase coined by St. Benedict).

My eyes and my emotions brought me a plethora of information and new sensations. I noticed I was watching the rhythm of this woman’s speech and the gestures of her hands and body. Her facial expressions and her eye contact gave me deeper clues about the content of her performance. All these things began to play a part in how I was learning to make sense of information. My other senses were beginning to compensate for the lost sense of hearing.

The next class I attended was lead by a speaker named Rocky Stone. Rocky was the founder of an organization called Self-Help for the Hard of Hearing, otherwise known as SHHH (now known as the Hearing Loss Association of America). He had lost his hearing at age 19 while serving with the U.S. Army in World War II. After graduating from college, he spent the next couple of decades working with the CIA. He told stories of how he used his lip-reading skills as a way of gathering information for the government, which I found fascinating!

As he explained his story slowly and clearly, I fought hard to keep back the tears. He spoke of his struggles coping with his hearing loss over the years, and I could identify with every challenge. He also spoke of his successes in spite of his hearing loss, by taking advantage of several kinds of assistive listening devices that were currently out on the market. Even though Rocky’s story was inspiring, I still had a hard time believing that I could be anywhere near as successful as he had been as a hearing impaired person.

The next day, I attended a workshop lead by a man who held his guitar the entire time he spoke. He reminded me a little of Jose Feliciano. His guitar and he were inseparable and his voice seemed resonant and deep. I could feel his songs vibrate in my bones. I sat right in front, my eyes never leaving him. I was blissfully captured in the cage of his guitar strings.

He handed out a paper with the lyrics to a song he had written about St. Barbara whose story was the inspiration for the fairy tale of Rapunzel. As this troubadour sang The Song of St. Barbara, I realized how closely the words in the first verse mirrored my own experience as a person who could no longer hear.

Like St. Barabara and Rapunzel, I felt imprisoned in a way, by the isolation and cold stone of silence that surrounded my daily life. I felt empty and broken. I sat in a trance as I watched this man put to song all that I was feeling – the loneliness, the anguish, the hopelessness…. The Song of St. Barbara gave me words to throw the torment from my soul.

I sat there captive and spellbound, struggling to hold back the tears, ensnared in my own arms that gripped me. I felt a deep and profound sadness. I remained in my chair for a long time after people had left that class. Like a person in awe of a profoundly stirring film, I stayed in my seat well after the credits had been played because I could not bring myself to move.

“Who am I?” I wondered. “Why did this happen to me? Why did I have to become deaf? Did I do something wrong? Am I being punished? What am I supposed to learn from this?” I protested wordlessly to God above.

“I thought I was a good person. I liked myself the way I was before. I had plans and goals and dreams. You gave me a gift, the gift of music. Now it’s gone. What am I supposed to do with myself now?” I secretly implored.

“Where is my life going? What is my purpose?” My mind whirled with questions.

“Will I ever be released from this tower of silence? Will I ever feel whole again?”

I felt broken, lost, and alone. It was as if a piece of my soul had been ripped away.

*(A note to my readers: These stories I have been posting on my storyblog happened many, many years ago. I write them to share the common experience of grief that those of us who lose our hearing go through during those early years of adjustment. But in the stories ahead, I will share how I learned to cope with and adjust to a world of silence, and ultimately, how I have embraced my deaf self and lived a very successful and fulfilling life. Keep on reading….)

Posted by LaRonda on Wednesday, August 1st, 2007 at 4:40 am.