I can't believe it. It is hard to find something for my son ..some kind of summer program for him! I have been looking in websites to find something for him this summer. More like a playgroup, weekly, or a drop in community center that have other hearing loss children as well. Not just random local places. I am little astonished to find that there is nothing. Not even another parent requesting the same thing...
I thought it would be easy to find thru facebook or yahoo group etc. I am hoping for even a playdate down in Birch Bay, WASH. We would go as far as Bellingham.. The reason I am picking something from Washington because we will be down there for the summer. SO I am hoping for the "connection" with other parents that have CI/ or children with hearing loss. I want Cory to have something he will grow with..not isolate him from his "community". I found one that we may go is Cochlear Picnic in Redwood Park in July ..but it would mean that we have to come back from crossing the borders to go there. I don't know why there isn't much of "deaf events" for children in BC nor Washington, USA. (I had thought it would be better there than here...)
ADOPTING A DEAF BOY, OUR JOURNEY & EXPERIENCES WITH COCHLEAR IMPLANTS.
I think that it's that the deaf community is and has been changing. I think it's more of a deaf/hearing community with all of the CI recipiants that are benifiting from the technology. Your son is a part of the 'new' deaf community and will be embraced with it as he grows with the other's in it. I do believe that people and parents do still need to remember that the kids are still deaf when the equipment isn't on, and give them the alternative forms of communication ie. ASL. As they WILL need it at some point in time. I can speak to that as we have had some time frames where the implant has failed. It is only a peice of equipment, so having the ASL as another language has really helped to bridge the frustrations.
ReplyDeleteBut I do think that with the CI community that the kids are being mainstreamed, because they do do so well with listening and verbal communication as well. I think that is why there aren't as many 'event's' or things to do for the kids because parents are just putting their children in the 'regular' programs. I'm not saying that it's right or not, but I just think that this is the community that is being created by the parents of today. I could be wrong, I'm just thinking out loud!! :)
Hmmm very interesting. I think as our kids grow it will be important for us to stick together and it may end up being that we try to put our kids in activities together and take turns as parents each taking a week or day to go along for the sign support or whatever our kids need to get the most out of it. I was talking to Cathy Chow/Luther today about the Sanderson family whose kids grew up with her kids and she said something to the affect that her kids social life really only existed due to the other families (from the deaf community) they stayed close with.
ReplyDeleteKim
I hear you Kim. I think that we do need to keep our kids and families in contact together after leaving BCFRC. And I do agree with you that we as parents need to ensure that this extended family that we are a part of need to stay close. I wish that there was more that did go on for the older kids that involved us families with the younger kids that was more consistant than once a year etc. I think it would be great to connect with families with older HOH/deaf children so that we can learn from eachother. It would be nice if there were more programs for the kids that were available to everyone.
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