This is really hard on me...please help me?

Some of you may have seen my posts regarding my personal acceptance of my own speech. First off, I'm going to describe the nature of my hearing loss and I do not want to see posts about me being not "deaf" for having a CI.

I was born profoundly deaf in both ears and I'm now implanted with unilateral Cochlear Implant. Before and after the surgery, I had speech therapy for six years. By then, my own speech was really polished and I had no problems communicating with people. This continued until I graduated from high school.

Now that I'm in university, I feel like running home each time I arrive for my classes. I absolutely dread going to university - although I love the school - because I've noticed that more and more people are judging me regarding my speech and giving me stares whenever I talk in public. When I was in high school (mainstreamed), my peers were surprisingly very kind towards me and accepting me of my deafness. They never made a comment on my own speech or stared at me when I talked really loudly in class - they honestly never cared (except one or two but that's it).

I have a class that has the component of tutorial in which I HAVE to participate if I want to do well. The problem is, last year, I did really well in the tutorials because I participated a lot (though with the absolute fear of someone's thoughts on my speech). Now I have another tutorial and I am absolutely terrified of participating. I don't understand why I'm having this sudden change. I was talking to my instructor (not about this issue; just something else) and I could tell that he couldn't understand me only a bit. He eventually understood me when I repeated my question again. Now after that encounter, I do not want to go to the tutorial anymore but I really want to get high grades.

I plan to go back to speech therapy even though I'm 18 and it's expensive. I have noticed that my speech has definitely got worse - for no reason that I can think of.

When I feel that no one would understand me, I know you, AllDeaf, can truly know what I'm feeling. Thank you for your understanding and advice.

What does doing a tutorial involve?

What is your major?

Guess the first year can be hard for you, and some students dont know you. maybe next year it will get better, and students get familiar with your speaking, and some teachers would get familiar with you. If you feel that you want to return to the speechtherapy then go for it. I hope you do make a time for yourself as well.

I used to have "perfect speech". Now not so much and my anxiety has become unbearable. I was diagnosed with acquired anxiety syndrome. Maybe you too?

If you know ASL get an Interpreter to do the talking.

I know several people over years since I was a kid. Lots of them do have the same siutation/experiences as you do. Some of them were willing to learn ASL and willing to make friends who are the similiar as them. They did gain their self esteem better and reduce their antiexy. BUT not always. Never hurt to learn ASL for your hobby, and continue to go to the speech therapy.

I actually don't know ASL so it's not possible for me to get an interpreter. Yes, it's my first year in Nursing, and a tutorial is basically a review of what we learned in lecture and involves discussion from all students. So it's like a formal conversation among all the students which is graded.

It's really hard for me to understand that my speech was indeed perfect and now it's...gone.
I don't know how to describe this feeling.

Strong said:

I actually don't know ASL so it's not possible for me to get an interpreter. Yes, it's my first year in Nursing, and a tutorial is basically a review of what we learned in lecture and involves discussion from all students. So it's like a formal conversation among all the students which is graded.

It's really hard for me to understand that my speech was indeed perfect and now it's...gone.
I don't know how to describe this feeling.

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I am curious of how you are doing in the Nursing classes, are you using the CART which is a typewritten on the computer screen with the help of someone who type into your CART like a TTY only that someone would listen to what your teacher (with microphone) said? That would make it easier for you to understand what everyone is saying if you fail to understand with lipreading.

As for your speech or your oral upbringing, ASL help you to communicate with interpreters so that they can voice it for you if you want to discuss with your professor or tutors. I know it is hard when it come with speech. Many d/Deaf have problems with speech even if you have spent 6 years of trying to make speech clearer or perfect which is not the way to go for the deaf. Our speech are totally different than hearing speech. There is no way to change around that. I hope you understand what I am trying to make sense of that for you.

OP, I totally empathize with what you are saying. Many of us here on a daily basis are encountering what you are now experiencing. I'm sorry to say this but being direct is the only way I can say this. You are no longer in a 'sheltered' environment. You are now out in the 'real world'. It's very unfortunate but somehow you'll have to put blinders on and ignore the 'stares' and 'uncomprehending' looks from them. It's not going to be easy but it will eventually not hurt so much.

What I would do is to plow through. OP, from what I can gather from your post, your prose is quite eloquent. Be proud of that ok? Many if not most of your fellow students are probably not that eloquent. You are only 18 and you have excellent prose already! When you speak, do you use 'academic' speech? Highly formal or informal with medical terminological terms thrown in? You might want to try the latter approach. Condense as much as possible. Be precise. After all you are not teaching. You're just relaying what you have learned. You are only concerned about impressing your teacher. That's it. Forget about the students. Just glance at them when speaking. Focus on the teacher.

Another thing I would suggest is to ask a friend to give you subtle hand signals if you are speaking too loud or too fast.

Oh yeah another thing. Additional speech therapy. You asked if you should. My take is no because you don't really have to. There are so many nurses who speak with accents, many of them practically unintelligible! As long as you are able to hear/speech read accurately and relay them either verbally or by written note, you should be fine.

Are you in counseling? You have other problems that might make you self conscious, coyld this be an extension of that? People might not be "staring at because of your speech" that might just be looking at you because you're talking. People to tend to look at someone when they're talking.

I think getting some therapy to deal with your self esteem might make you less self conscious.

Adding to Ambrosia's post, dealing with these issues are important not just for your college situation but for your career in nursing. Nursing requires all kinds of people contact and stressful situations. If you are having problems coping at school, it isn't going to be any easier once you start working. It's better to resolve these issues now.

sonocativo said:

If you know ASL get an Interpreter to do the talking.

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I decided to just not speak in public since the noise level here is far greater than it was where I previously lived and the fact I'm trans and my hearing stands in the way of having a passable female voice, I just write things down now and I don't feel the anxiety from thinking I sound like an idiot or a man and since I eliminate that, I am passable and people just think of me as a young deaf woman I guess?

Not the same thing as the OP, but I do incorporate ASL into it at times when I write things down (Namely when I place an order at a resturant).

Like Ambrosia & Reba said, you might want to get to the true cause of your anxiety, it is possible you have a medical reason for the drastic change in your speech abilities.

Speech impairment therapy due to medical reasons (deafness) is usually covered under most insurance companies, so you might want to look into what your options are....but don't expect much, as they all put caps on how many sessions are deemed necessary.

There is no law that says you must speak....you can choose to be mute. Unfortunately you don't know SEE or ASL, which could help your situation a little, but it is not a requirement to get an interpreter to speak for you. (don't hold it against me)

You are not alone at this....I cannot use ASL and speak at the same time in front of crowds...it is either one or the other, anxiety sets in and prevents me from relaxing enough to do both.

Have you heard from people that college is supposed to be the best time of your life? No offense, but it seems like you are talking too much. If you look take a real hard look at your major, you would be surprised at how many people will be in your corner. The person who make fun of your speech may not be using his/her time to get the needed networking. If you go out of way to meet with people who carries clout in their profession, you will be getting a lot of good advices.

It seems like you're a new student. You'll eventually cross path with other nurse CI users. Google is your best friend. Why not get in touch with other CI users in nursing field ?

First off, I want to say thank you so much for all of your responses. This means a lot to me as it shows me that I'm not alone and that my situation is heard.

I should have been more clear in my first post. I'm a first year in university and yes, I've heard that university/college is the best time of your life. But I don't really like coming to university - in fact, I hate it. I don't like talking to people anymore now. In the first class or so, I've been talking to people (I pushed myself out of my shell) in order to make new friends, but they don't talk back to me. For example, I would keep having conversations with them and in lecture halls, I would see my classmates coming in with their own friends whereas I would enter the classroom all alone. I mean I don't understand it. I pushed myself to make new friends and know many of them but none returned the favour.

This is depressing. To the response by ambrosia, yes, I'm facing other personal hardships that may account for my self-consciousness or low self-esteem. Those who I know encourage me to go to see a psychiatrist or a psychologist but I absolutely refuse it. Here's the story:

I've been battling depression for 6 years (I'm serious) and one of my high school teachers put me in counselling. To be frank, I did not like the counsellors. Usually when you go for counselling, you expect the therapist to be compassionate and caring, not pushy or rude. I had two in past; both of them were nice but the first one would be like, "......WHAT??" whenever she did not get me and would give me an attitude. I'm NOT making this up. I was surprised she did this considering she was really good at solving problems but I didn't like her attitude. The second one was okay; she would rest her head on her fist and her elbow on the arm of the chair. She looked so boring and I kept talking and talking while she kept nodding off. There were some points during the conversation where she didn't understand me and she was like, "What? what did you say?"

This is why I gave up. I got to admit it - my depression got really bad during the winter but I somehow got out of this dark hole. But that's something else. I will go back to speech therapy and am dedicated to better improve my speech.

Don't let two unsatisfactory counselors prevent you from getting the help you need and deserve. See if your university provides any resources.

Reba said:

Don't let two unsatisfactory counselors prevent you from getting the help you need and deserve. See if your university provides any resources.

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My university actually has psychologists who are really good, at least that's what I hear from other students.

But my biggest fear is....the past. What IF the psychologist or psychiatrist would not understand me now that I'm noticing more and more people don't get it? This is why I absolutely fear going to the counsellor. I mean just because other people say the counsellors are good doesn't mean they will be to me.

Do you know what I mean? Today I went for shopping at a local mall and I ordered a meal from a restaurant. I asked for salmon and rice, so after I got my meal I went to pay for it. The cashier noticed that it's not salmon and told me it was actually pork. It could be that I didn't hear the person telling me that it was pork chop. I don't know but I was telling the story to my brother and he said, "it could be that they didn't understand you." I was heartbroken because I swore the misunderstanding came from me NOT hearing the person, not my speech.

I want to say thank you so much again. Your help and advice means a lot to me.

I've read all the wonderful responses, Strong. Brief history about me. I hit 60 this year and that's important I think for a perspective to a college fellow. But, I was your age once . I did well my first year but I can't say I had any sort of a blast.

I grew up hearing. My speech after many years of speech therapy remained perfect. I had a CI 10/24/13. My bone conduction in one ear is gone as well as my hearing, as expected. The unexpected is in the slow changes and loss of my perfect speech that I have fought my life to maintain. So, I am getting comments but just from my partner. 20+ years ago, I asked her to let me know if I started sounding deaf. She's doing her due diligence. She told me last night that my speech was soft and blurry. I've heard it going inside my head for a while and it sounds fuzzy. Today, I told a neighbor friend my hearing is getting worse and I signed to her a bit (I don't know ASL). She groaned. I told her not to feel bad for me that I'll be fine and I meant that. At this stage of my life, while it's weird for my speech to be finally getting worse, at least people will LIKELY understand I am deaf. Having perfect hearing was very confusing to people. I didn't look HoH or deaf and I didn't sound it. But based on what I'm learning I acted like it but people didn't "get it."

As Reba and Ambrosia have both suggested and I'm adding my two cents, you've gone to two counselors. They did not work out. Go to another. If it doesn't work, trust me... drop 'em and go to another. I am and I have. I'm having a tough time dealing with the effects of the implant. I opted against going to a counselor who could hear. I don't need someone who can listen, I need to understand how to adapt and what is going on with my head. I changed my mind about going to a dude who said he had a "Ben Bernake" mustache and beard who dealt with clients who are hard of hearing. I ended up finding a very-well lettered MSW...., xxxx (I was told what they meant but forgot). She has an implant and uses pigeon sign for me. I know that may be useless to you. But what's important is that you find the right match and don't give up. Look for deaf and hard of hearing services where you are as difficult as that may be (it was for me). If you don't have insurance, they may take a sliding scale fee. Sheri363 talks about how wonderfully you write. You absolutely do.

I hate to recommend this but if you are indeed filled with that much anxiety, you may want to connect with a psychiatrist who can give you low doses of anti-anxiety or depression medications. My biggest concern about this is that you're in college and they may slow down your thinking process.

This is why I wanted to do a power point presentation at two hospitals (I volunteered locally where we now live). Strong, we moved south one year after I landed in the ignorant hospital. I was in for many days where people were accessing my chart and making incorrect conclusions about how I was acting. I ended up explaining it to the head nurse and it was pretty annoying. It was bad enough that we figured out the next time I'm in a hospital we have to write d-e-a-f across my face. We nixed that because we didn't think anyone would understand the implications.

You're in nursing. Do something to educate them about what it means to be deaf and how to react to someone either with a hearing loss or who is deaf. The hospitals will be seeing more and more baby boomers who have hearing issues. Do an extra credit project on this?

I'm glad your class knows. Voice modulation is tough. In my 20s, I borrowed a dB meter and used it at work . Prior to the implant, I borrowed another and used it in the neighborhood. It didn't help but it
was fun and interesting.

I wish you the sincerest best of luck. Keep asking questions. We're all here for you as you obviously noticed.
--Sheri (not Sheri363 )

I honestly feel like crying right now because after reading the responses, I felt like someone has finally understood me and has not passed judgements on me. This is really hard on me and, as sheri363 mentioned, I am coming to terms with the "harsh" reality of the world. But I feel like this is the step towards my acceptance of who I am. Sometimes I would wish I could go back to high school where the students that you don't even know would stand up for you. There was this new girl in my class and we have never met but after she found out that I have hearing loss, she took notes in class for me. That blew me away.

Mind you, I met someone who asked me about my experience with speech therapy and made a comment that at least I don't sound like I "have an intellectual disability." Then she talked about speech therapy in general. What's ironic about this is that she revealed at the end that she has a son who developed a stutter suddenly and they are both struggling to overcome this issue.

What.