Quote:
Originally Posted by faire_jour
Thank you all!
I have a friend who has 2 Deaf kids with CI's, (she was the first parent I ever met that I didn't want to smack) she had researched and decided that she wanted to give her children everything, so she implanted them and then used ASL (well, more like CASE, but COME ON, she tried!) at home. She has one child who is totally oral, she signs with him, but he refuses. He is mainstreamed at a local school. Her other child doesn't speak and attends the bi-bi school with my daughter now. She told me she wished she had been brave enough not to implant her kids. She told me she still looks at them and cries, she told me that we "are the family we wished she had been strong enough to be". That was a huge compliment because by all outside observers her son is exactly what people think all Deaf people should become. He is mainstreamed and a hearing/speaking child....and is mother wishes he would sign
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You know, I have been told by a couple of members of this board that by not implanting my son and insisting on a bi-bi atmosphere for him that I took the "easy" way out. Of course, they were also parents of implanted children, and were using oral only education and home environment for their chidlren.
My own son is now 22, is a college student with a 3.5 GPA, and has oral skills if he needs them. He prefers sign. He is happy and well adjusted. If he wants to be implanted, he is free to make that decision. However, because he was raised with an environment that gave him skills in both languages, and the ability to achieve no matter the environment he finds himself in, he does not see how an implant would improve the quality of his life. He chooses not to be implanted at this time.