Audiology Outside the Box PLLC

Greetings, followers of Audiology Outside the Box! I’m sure that some of you have been wondering why this account has gone silent for a few weeks. I’ve been dealing with a family medical emergency since July and am just now getting back to regular life: my spouse was diagnosed with a form of autoimmune encephalitis, which is a rare disease that is challenging to identify. For the past several weeks, my full attention has been needed at home and in my full time job. But now, I’m back! I look forward to engaging with you again on social media starting again on Monday, October 31. 🤟🏻

Teaching deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) children self-advocacy skills is important. Self-advocacy plays a significant role in my professional life as an educational audiologist and in my personal life as a deaf adult. What is self-advocacy? It's the ability to ask for what I need, explain my communication preferences and technologies to others, let people know when communication breakdown happens, and use my resources to solve communication problems. Teaching these skills to DHH kids is one of my favorite parts of my job.

But here's something you might not know about self-advocacy: it is not a magic solution to every communication problem. DHH people are often blamed when communication breakdown happens or when one of our own needs is not met. We are told that we should have asked for repetition, been clearer about what we needed, asked for an interpreter farther in advance, or used different words or a different tone to state our needs. Sometimes when we ask for accommodations that are our legal right, we are told that we have asked for too much. DHH people might find ourselves in trouble at home, school, or work *because* of self-advocacy. There are times when others become angry or frustrated because we have asked for multiple repetitions, set a boundary that we cannot attend a meeting if an interpreter is not present, or given reminders about agreed-upon accommodations.

DHH people are not perfect. Like everyone else, we have bad days. We get frustrated when we do not have our access needs met. We might not always use words that feel good to hearing people when our needs are not being met. But that does not take away the realness of our communication needs, and it does not mean that all problems would resolve if DHH people were better self-advocates. Communicating effectively with a DHH person requires effort from the hearing person too. Self-advocacy is important, but it will not get very far if our hearing conversation partners place the burden of communication fully on us. Communication is a team effort!