Sleepy Greetings

It’s 10:30 on a Saturday morning, and I’m ready to start the day. I go to wake up my boyfriend, Tyler, gently pushing on his chest.  

“Honey, it’s time to wake up. Let’s go!” 

He grumbles and grunts, rustling the sheets and not opening his eyes.  

“Sweetie, wake up!” 

I shake his shoulders very slightly, just enough to slightly rouse him. 

Still asleep, he turns over to face me and just slightly lifts his head up. Without ever opening his eyes, he brings his fingertips to his chin, palm perpendicular to his body, and his thumb tucked in. He then collapses onto the bed and lays there, almost lifeless. 

For people that don’t know sign language, what he just said to me was “bitch.” 

I sat in bed with my arms crossed, giving him the dirtiest look I possibly can, even if he can’t see it. I play games on my phone, waiting for him to wake up.  

He finally wakes up over an hour later, and I stare sternly at him, with my lips pursed and my brow scrunched. 

“Excuse me, Tyler. Do you remember what you said to me this morning?” 

He looks at me, confused. “No, what did I do?” 

I cross my arms and tell him, “You called me a bitch in sign language.” 

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Superpowers

In my personal experience, I’ve always noticed that since my parents were deaf, it was always like their other senses were extremely heightened. I’ve briefly talked about this in another blog post, but they would smell my chocolate the second I opened the wrapper and know I was sneaking candy.

Even now, they both can smell things that I can’t at all. We do have to take the garbage out slightly more than I’d like to, because my parents can smell any garbage even with a scented bag and hiding the garbage can under the sink.

Besides having a super heightened sense of smell, they didn’t have many other superpowers, but they used that superpower extremely well. It was usually to catch me feeding my sugar addiction, but as parents it was the best superpower they could probably ask for.

Animal Behavior

Something that I think is really interesting is how animals interact with humans and how they adapt to certain things. You may be asking what this has to do with either deaf people or being a CODA. Well, throughout my life, I haven’t had many pets, but when I was in high school, my dad adopted some cats.

When I meet other deaf people that have animals, I like to ask them if they think their pets know that they’re deaf, because my cats absolutely know that my dad is deaf. They love my dad and they know exactly how to get his attention. They still meow at him, but they know that he won’t be able to hear them, so they will always reach up and tap on his arm with their paws. I don’t know many other cats that do that with hearing people, but these cats have adapted and know that tapping is the best way to get attention.

A few years ago, I was cat sitting for my dad, and at the time, the cats didn’t have free range of the house and lived in my dads bedroom. It was fairly late at night and I woke up because they were running around the room and jumping in boxes. I woke up and turned on the light and yelled, “Hey! I can hear you!” Since then, they know that I can hear and have even adapted to that.

Pranks

Growing up, my brother was a bit of a practical joker and loved scaring me. But not only did he prank me, but he often pranked my mom.

The most memorable prank is when I was about 16 or so. It was an early Saturday morning and I walked into the kitchen to get breakfast. In the room next to the kitchen, my mom was talking to a friend on her video phone. Suddenly, my brother came into the kitchen and yelled, “Get down and be quiet!” I’m not really sure why we needed to be quiet, but I was not quiet. I could not stop laughing as my brother army crawled across the dining room and under my mom’s chair. He got as far under her chair that he could and then grabbed her legs and scared the crap out of her. I still cry of laughter to this day. My mom didn’t find it as funny as we did.

We often would hide behind doors and scare her as she would walk into rooms, and normally I’m awful at pranks because I can’t help but giggle and I tend to shift around and just make a lot of noise. With a deaf mother, I can be as loud as I want as long as she isn’t wearing her hearing aid.

Slang

Although Sign Language is a non-verbal form of communication, there is still a decent amount of slang that still happens. Now the slang that I’ll talk about is not known to everyone, these are just things I’ve encountered in my community.

A few years ago, my dad came up to me and threw up the shocker and asked me if I knew what that meant. I’m not going to explain what the shocker is but you can look that up yourself. It’s not a very cute meaning. Hesitant, I told my dad “Do you know what that means?” He responded by saying “It means hi!” I’m not sure how many people actually used this, but it makes sense. The shocker does the sign for h and i at the same time, but I frantically told my dad to never use that in public.

There are many little signs my family use, such as the rocker sign for bullshit, like bull horns. I also made up many signs when I was younger, because I didn’t know the actual sign, and because of that, it’s become like slang in my family. Slang happens in all languages and varies between everyone, and obviously there are cultural lapses in slang, such as using the shocker just to say hi. It’s not the greeting I’d really like, so luckily, I’ve never seen it after that first instance.

Talking Trash: Part 2

So, since my parents can’t hear, you might wonder if my brother and I ever complained about them while they were nearby. And mom, if you’re reading this, I apologize in advance because the answer is yes absolutely, all the time. My brother and I learned how to talk without moving our lips and we would do it all the time to complain about typical teenage annoyances about our parents.

The thing is that sometimes, my mom would slightly be able to hear that we were talking, but she wouldn’t actually hear the words, just a muffled noise. And being the terrible and mischievous teenagers that we were, she wouldn’t actually be able to prove that we were talking and we would just tell her, “Mom, no I didn’t say anything. I’m just sitting here.” When really we were complaining to one another. (Again, sorry mom. Love you)

We don’t really do that anymore, but I can still talk without moving my lips. Not quite as good as most ventriloquists, but it’s fairly impressive still. As a CODA, you learn lots of ways to be sneaky, and my brother and I definitely had many sneaky tactics.