HLAA Hearing Loss Magazine July/August 2010 - 9

By Jennifer Thorpe

ennifer Thorpe not only has a hearing loss, she has a family too. Often people say it’s the family’s hearing loss, not just the person with it. Read how a wife and mother of five balances it all. In March of 1976, when I was four years old, my parents, my two younger brothers, my grandparents, and I all climbed into a brilliant orange Volkswagen van and left central Tennessee, and headed for Virginia. As the story goes, I fell asleep in the backseat of the van, and half an hour later woke up almost totally unable to hear. My parents were not completely taken by surprise, as they had already noticed that my hearing seemed to fluctuate quite a bit, but this was a defining moment. This time the loss was sudden and quite severe. The family trip to Virginia was cut short. Back home, visits with the hearing specialists started.

language classes. Then I continued the speech classes at school. In second grade, I was assigned a teacher’s aide. Mrs. Woods faithfully took notes, made sure we had good seating and reminded me to “pay attention!” for the next five years (rightfully so, as I had the attention span of a gnat when it came to school work and she earned her money honestly). I graduated from high school in 1989 and decided to give college a try. At that time I had no strong aspirations to be anything, although I was most interested in special education and English. I just felt that college was something that I should do, and I did it. I didn’t do it very well though because I was far too social, and uninterested in focusing on studies. After three semesters of a rather disappointing academic career, the school and my parents both strongly suggested that I take a break from higher education.

soon after that he needed a brother to play cowboys and Indians with, but instead, over the next few years, he was blessed with Katie, Rachel, Claire, and Ellie … four beautiful sisters who did not share his interests at all.

Managing with Hearing Loss
As a small child, I learned that my hearing loss made me “different.” When my family and I made the joint decision after my seventh grade year that I didn’t need an aide anymore, I embraced that opportunity to attempt to blend into the “normal” world. I became very dependent on speechreading. I got more information from what I saw than from what I heard. If I couldn’t see your face, chances were that I had no idea what you were saying. I downplayed my hearing loss to my husband for years. I never asked for help unless it was absolutely necessary. As a result, he treated me as a hearing person, which frustrated me badly at times. He didn’t seem to realize how much I struggled…but that was my fault, because I wasn’t honest about needing help. Later when I suddenly lost all of my hearing and was left completely deaf for a period of time, that was a huge adjustment. He had to be my ears all the time. From the day my babies were born, they slept with me in our bed. My husband worked nights when our son was born, and having him in another room where I couldn’t hear him was too scary.

Simply Me
The search for the cause of the loss provided no answers; it was finally simply labeled as “idiopathic bilateral hearing loss”… a fancy way of saying that I was deaf in both ears and nobody really knew why. I had no hearing at all in my left ear and my hearing hovered around the 95 decibel level in my right ear. Within weeks I was fitted with my first hearing aid—a shiny silver Zenith pocket hearing aid.

From the Altar to Baby Bottles
Less than a year later, I was invited to a Bible study by one of my friends. As the oldest of four, I had inherited my parent’s minivan, so, for obvious reasons, I was very popular when large groups of young people wanted to go places. I drove my future husband to Bible study that night, and on the way home, he sat up in front with me and we attempted a conversation while I drove. Even with the overhead light on, the conversation wasn’t very successful, but apparently that didn’t deter him. Dicky and I started dating three weeks later, and three months later, in February 1992, we were married. We were blessed with our first baby right away. Our son Will was born two weeks before our first wedding anniversary. We decided

Bluffing Became My Game
I rarely asked for help. I would tell my high school and college teachers that I needed a seat close to the front so that I could hear, and that was about it. If I didn’t hear something, too bad—I just didn’t hear it. If I was in a group and someone told a joke, I became a pro at laughing just because everyone else was. I had a few friends in my life from kindergarten onward who knew I didn’t hear everything, and if they or
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July/August 2010 9

Mainstream Schooling
I was already an avid reader and an extroverted child so several months later my parents made the choice to mainstream me into public school kindergarten. Every week for the next few years my mother took me to the Bill Wilkerson Hearing and Speech Center in Nashville for speech classes and sign

HLAA Hearing Loss Magazine July/August 2010

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of HLAA Hearing Loss Magazine July/August 2010