Before you can truly be good for anyone, you need to look after yourself first, or so the old saying goes. As parents and caregivers of children with hearing loss, sometimes it can feel like practicing self-care feels selfish, or at least an afterthought. Though many parents and caregivers often put the needs and care of their children before that of themselves and their relationships (and rightly so), a happy balance can and should be forged.

Despite these relatively enlightened times, many still respond and react to difference in funny ways. Today a child with hearing loss isn’t likely to confront the same kind of discrimination they would 50 years ago, but many parents of children struggle to confront the decidedly softer side of discrimination, including special treatment and tokenizing.

Taking even a quick look at the heft of writings available on building a positive identity for a kid with special needs can be overwhelming. Generations before, the only gaze parents had to worry about was that of family members, then the last century’s glut of pop-psychology parenting books. Now everyone who can figure out a basic blogging platform can “publish” on the ins and outs of anything, including parenting.

It’s that time of year again. The kids are back in school, bringing along dozens of play dates, birthday parties, video game marathons and sleepovers. Likely one of the biggest worries the parents of children who are deaf/HH surround issues of social inclusion. Will my child fit in? Will they feel isolated? Will they be picked on? Or closer to the point, how do I best prepare them to go out into social circles designed for and by hearing people?

No matter what the nature of child’s hearing loss, it’s very likely that at some point in their early childhood, they will ask about the possibility of their hearing being permanently “fixed.”

Every family is different, with each carrying its own measures of successes and challenges. With a child with hearing loss, however, there can be a different set of hurdles to navigate every day. It’s easy (and often necessary) to direct a disproportionate amount of energy and support toward your deaf/HH child, and miss some cues from other children in the family.

In some of my articles, I have discussed my experiences growing up with significant hearing and eyesight loss. I have no hearing in my left ear, and significantly reduced vision in my left eye. Growing up in a family whose members played high-level sports throughout their lives, my parents were somewhat flummoxed about getting me involved in sports. Due to my not-quite-“normal” abilities, playing sports presented a few concerns.

As the parent of a deaf or hard-of-hearing child, no one needs to tell you about the challenges you face day-to-day. More specifically, over 90% of deaf/HH children are born to hearing parents, it’s not unlikely that your efforts to best raise your child into a happy and successful adult may feel like learning a new language.

The latest in assistive hearing technologies has come a long way in the past 15 years, especially in the realm of background noise reduction. When I received my first hearing aid in 1993, I would simply turn it off when faced with any setting filled with competing noises.

The best thing about the Internet is that anyone can have a website. Unfortunately, that’s also the worst thing about the internet: anyone can have a website.