Supporting a Deaf young person
“Patience and empathy are essential qualities. A Youth MHFAider can never be sure of a young person’s past experiences and different levels of emotional sensitivity.” Zara, 15 years old If you are supporting a Deaf young person, it is important to gain some background knowledge of what it means to be deaf. Learning about different types of communication, terminology, and Deaf culture generally will help you to understand how living as a deaf person in a hearing world can impact on the self- esteem, identity, and wellbeing of deaf people. This will aid you in supporting them. The Royal National Institute of Deaf People (RNID) found in their survey of 8,000 people that more than half of Deaf people have experienced negative attitudes from others in the year previous to the study. Many of these said they faced negative attitudes from their own families. The study found that over half of the respondents had been told that “it doesn’t matter” by someone when they were struggling to understand what was being said. For British Sign Language (BSL) users, the impact is often more significant. A large proportion of BSL users said they felt disrespected, excluded, and isolated from people around them, leading to withdrawal, and to hiding their Deafness or hearing loss from the public (147). Remember to support the young person as a whole person with many different identities – try not to focus only on their deafness. The Deaf community is not homogeneous – it encompasses individuals from diverse backgrounds, each bringing their own unique perspectives and experiences. This diversity includes variations in race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and additional
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