Silent, Silenced
Struggles of an Unconventionally Deaf Child
by Luisa Gabriela Jarabe
“Ate, tingnan mo!” My sister squealed in excitement and I looked up from our grocery cart to whip my head in her direction, “may hearing aid din siya!”
The faint gleam of the curved metal winked back at us, glimmer dancing across my sister’s eyes as she found rare comfort in the mere presence of someone similar to her. It was not every day that we saw another deaf person who chose to use a hearing aid instead of sign language. I smiled at her, happy she found relief in another’s existence. Yet, as quickly as the hope finds home in her eyes, the moment is snatched from her grasp as a voice calls us back to reality. “Ma’am, priority lane po ‘to. May kasama po ba kayong senior o PWD?”
My sister looked up at me, waiting for me to interpret the cashier’s words into the language we have cultivated at home. I sighed and steeled myself, turning back to the cashier. “PWD po kapatid ko,” I justified and turned her head to the side, “may hearing aid din siya.”
Society has long kept Persons With Disabilities (PWDs) in a box of discriminatory, ableist notions that they must need total assistance to the point of prejudice and ridicule, completely disregarding the spectrum of differences in disabilities and diminishing the agency and capabilities of PWDs themselves. This dominant view has affected the internal community of PWDs, furthering internalized ableism within their niches and breeding habits of learned helplessness that hinder them from accessing provisions mandated by law.
Section 2 of Republic Act (RA) 7277, or the Magna Carta for Disabled Persons, highlights the long-term goal of empowering PWDs as self-reliant and autonomous citizens through various forms of state assistance. But these “state assistance” have been patterned after a generalization of the needs of PWDs — a wide range of “one-size-fits-all” services to accommodate their perceived needs with little to no proper consultation.
Many PWDs like my sister, Julie, have developed a sense of learned helplessness: the condition wherein an individual feels extreme powerlessness due to a repeated negative experience. While my sister is considered deaf, she does not fit the conventional definition of a deaf person: Julie is hard of hearing and has used hearing aids since she was 2.6 years old. Whenever we would introduce her to people outside of our family, they would always turn to us with a skeptical attitude and whisper, “ah, so she uses sign [language]…?” Unbeknownst to them, my sister could hear and fully understand; she would simply smile and wait for our mother or me to explain and showcase her hearing devices. At first, I thought it was because she was not confident in her speaking skills as a child yet. It was only recently that she opened up to me about how she really feels.
“Why don’t you tell more people that you’re a PWD in the bus or train? You’re practically denying yourself of your rights,” I asked Julie one night.
“Well, I just don’t feel confident enough to explain it. They won’t understand, anyways–I’m deaf, but not ‘sign language deaf’,”she replied with a sigh. “I just feel like you and mommy have more ‘authority’ than me. They’ll most likely understand and listen to you more.”
Stunned was an understatement for what I felt that night. All these years, I thought I was helping my sister by explaining to others her condition for her. It was only that night that I realized that by taking away her opportunities to speak about herself, I played a part in slowly cultivating learned helplessness in her, completely counterintuitive to the long-term goal of self-reliance in the aforementioned law.
More than just self-reliance, the social services mandated by law penetrate multiple facets of a PWD’s life: their education, health, livelihood, sustenance, and even entertainment are given assistance to allow PWDs to enjoy a fulfilling life. However, it seems these services are caged in a box locked by a key one can only obtain by undergoing an inevitable arduous process: surviving the bureaucratic red tapes. After moving cities, my sister needed a new PWD ID to fully access her mandated services.
“They rejected my PWD application,” my sister exhaustedly slumped down her chair at the dinner table one night. “They said my hearing records aren’t enough. I have to get checked by another doctor.”
“What? What other proof do you need to prove that you’re a PWD? You literally have a hearing aid on you,” I replied promptly, feeling her exhaustion from across the table.
“They said I got checked by the wrong doctor — a general practitioner — and needed an ENT doctor’s signature on my records instead,” she explained, tears welling in her eyes. “But that means I have to skip school again. I can’t keep missing out on my classes just to prove I’m deaf.”
Skipping school — a fear I never thought I would hear my sister express, given that she used to be quick to dismiss her academics in pursuit of her love for the arts. However, just as her passionate brush slowly canvasses a sketch of her artistic vision, Julie was unknowingly sketching the foundations of internalized ableism within her as well. Internalized ableism occurs when a PWD perpetuates the same discriminatory notions and practices to other PWDs from other niches within their community. The cleavages between unique disabilities paint a vast difference in perception and treatment of people who have apparent disabilities as compared to those with non-apparent disabilities: a portrait of a double-edged sword. While those with apparent disabilities are often extended more patience and care by the general public, people often see the disability before the person — who they are not, before who they truly are. On the other hand, those with non-apparent disabilities are not necessarily framed by their disability alone; however, they are given the expectation to function as a ‘normal’ person would, subject to public ridicule should they fail to do so. This dichotomy has put my sister in an awkward position in her school setting.
“The ‘normal ones’ don’t really like to include me in group works because I have difficulties in keeping up in class,” my sister explained when I asked her about her school’s environment. My expectations are quite different from her answer considering she studies in one of the most PWD-friendly schools.
“What? Isn’t that quite ableist of them? Just because you’re a PWD doesn’t mean you can’t learn and do better,” I quickly replied, my instincts to defend her were as sharp as ever. “Who are you usually grouped up with, then?”
“They give me the neurodivergent ones. Apparently, I’m too dumb for the ‘normal ones’ but smart enough to carry the slow kids. I hate it,” she expounded. We shared a glance, and she slowly realized. “Oh.”
“Yeah… don’t you think that’s quite unfair of you, too?” I probed, wanting her to come to her own conclusions on the matter. She looked up back to me, a mix of sadness and confusion etched across her eyes.
“I know it’s wrong, but I just don’t want them to hold me down. I feel like I have to be great or nothing for people to acknowledge me at all.”
Great or nothing; to dream of everything when you were once treated as nothing — a constant tug-of-war of the pursuit of excellence chained down by the dream of simple acceptance. To many PWDs like my sister, excellence is not a luxury that they could forego; to be great or nothing is a race they must run barefoot in a track where others have the unnoticed comfort of shoes.
The perpetuation of social injustices towards PWDs begins to end when PWDs realize any possible forms of internalized ableism they continue to spread. Only their sustained and organized self-advocacy would allow the state to properly assess and reevaluate pre-existing social services that uphold the rights of the PWD community. But true progressive change cannot be realized without the conjoined participation of non-disabled persons as well. Truly changing the environment for PWDs starts at the fundamental development spaces for children with disabilities. By starting at home, families must adapt and take into consideration the needs of their family member with a disability, creating a safe and empowering environment for the PWD to flourish in their career. This further extends to the school and the workplace environments that nurture the capabilities of the PWD as a functioning and self-reliant member of society. Further, the state needs to properly reassess the assistance it extends to PWDs and ensure that the attainment of these services aligns with the diverse community it serves.
“Ate, let’s not use the Senior/PWD cart in the LRT next time,” my sister said, squeezing my hand as we walked through the bustling crowd. Amid the commotion, I found the space to gently ask her why — to make sure I heard her — and she meekly responded: “I just don’t want to feel stupid. I know they were looking at me while I took up a seat, like I should be guilty of using up spaces made for PWDs. I don’t ever want to feel like I’m ‘not disabled’ enough.”
