I was not born deaf. I became deaf. I have two sisters and one brother who are deaf also. We did not know why we are deaf, but I think it is family genetics. I also have some more family, an uncle, aunt, and cousin that are deaf.

My parents were from Mexico but my two sisters, brother and I were born in America. My parents told me how we moved to America and they did not want me to be born in Mexico. I believe when my mom was pregnant with me, they went visit family in Denver, Colorado, and I was born there in Denver, Colorado. I was born in Denver, and we returned home to Mexico and lived there.

I remember my first language was Spanish. We all spoke Spanish. I remember I used to like to hear Mexican music, and we danced to my favorite music of Selena Quintanilla-Perez. I remember what the house looks like in Mexico. I have a home in Mexico. The place looks like Mexican urban style, colorful, never boring style, and a lot of decorating as a Mexican house. One day, I became deaf. My parent didn’t tell me what happened when I became deaf. I remember all of a sudden, I cannot hear anymore. I have no idea what happened. It is suddenly a quiet sound, but I remember we all speak loudly, but I can tell something is wrong.

My parents said, “We need to move to America.” I remember we moved from Mexico, Ciudad Juarez to El Paso, Texas. I remember my parents were excited; we got our first apartment in America! We were excited! New life, I remember I went to hearing school first. I believe that is when I had discovered a hearing loss. My parents thought I could hear better, like not that bad of a hearing loss.

I remember going to hearing school first. I never forgot that I was very lost when I attended hearing school. I felt silent. The teacher talked to me silently, no sound. I felt baffled. I have no idea what is happening. I felt silence. At this time, I had no hearing aid. I had no friends. I did not talk to anyone. The teacher spoke to me constantly and I had no idea what was happening.

My parents wanted me to go to a deaf school. I don’t think my parents spoke with me about what happened to me to become deaf because they really had no idea how to respond. When I went to deaf school, I was lost. I do see everyone is moving their hands and fingers. I have no idea what this is. I started learning about deaf school. I received new hearing aids! I was able to hear! I began to learn productively about this Deaf culture and deaf school. I remember that I needed to study my sign language and speech because I am partially deaf, I have maybe a 60 percent hearing loss. I started to understand what happened to me when I became deaf.

Over a short period of time, I felt a little disappointed, to be honest, as it happens at school. I felt like I blamed the school for teaching me late, I think. “Why?”, I said that is because “when I was young, I remember I wasn’t taught at the same level as other kids’ level. For example, I started learning sign language, practiced a lot on that, and focused on sign language. Also, I did have speech therapy. I did speech therapy; but we weren’t taught how to read and write from there.”

I believe that they put that on hold and do this first instead of reading and writing. I wish I had a better, stronger, initial reading and writing experience! I learned a sign language call SEE language means Sign Exactly English. I have no idea what other languages we have because there are other languages and it is called ASL. ASL is American Sign Languages. It’s more like general languages like everyone should use it as ASL language. But my school did not agree with ASL, and they did not believe ASL, and they believe ASL is not language.

I am not sure why; our school made the decision that we will use SEE language. I grew up learning SEE languages. I believe I started to learn how to read when I was in second grade. I learned fundamental reading and sign SEE at the same time with speech as well. I started my first mainstream class in middle school with math class because I am advanced in the math class because I have a mathematical mind. I was mainstreamed class for class, and it was kind of okay, but I didn’t have a friend in math class. What I mean is, “I didn’t have a friend in math class for example, I have an assignment that I would need help on, group work. I kind of need a group who can plan and manage time. Refine understanding through discussion and explanation, who can work together towards helping other people or common goals. All I do is focus on math class with an interpreter.” When I was in high school. I start to have more mainstream classes with English, math, and history. I believe history is my favorite class. It talks about history. I love it!

I am not sure why, where I am from in Texas, they focused on the SEE, and if you go to a different state, most of them use ASL. I am still unsure of the difference between ASL and SEE, but I understand what is different. When I grew up, I continued to learn to use SEE Languages. I believe that there are many different kinds of sign languages. As of right now, I prefer a sign which is SEE. ASL is very popular, and they believe that it is an actual language and has its unique grammar system. SEE is an exact spoken English and more like for hard of hearing people and that is me because I can hear a little bit and I can hear the sound of present tense, back present or “tion”, sound of “s” something like that, but ASL is completely different it is all with the hand with no sound. For many of my readers you may not understand the complexity of SEE and ASL Languages. For example, SEE Sign. SEE mean Sign Exactly English, it will show with sign with “have, had”, communication. SEE does have signs with each word. ASL will sign like you draw an image or picture like you have to describe and they will sign like “have, had, has” with all same sign. “Soup and spoon” signs are the same. It is complex. This is the continuing story or saga of how I still use SEE, this is the story as it is happening right now.