Read Online Hands of My Father: A Hearing Boy, His Deaf Parents, and the Language of Love by Myron Uhlberg - Free Book Online
Authors: Myron Uhlberg
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tongue depressor found its way into my hand without any conscious thought on my part. Holding his mouth open, I thrust the depressor into his mouth and pushed aside his tongue. Most nights I was successful. Some nights I managed to get my fingers out of his mouth before it snapped shut, but I was not able to clear his tongue completely from his clenching jaws. Then the blood would fly. Occasionally I was not quick enough to remove my fingers before his jaws clamped shut, and then my blood would mingle with his.
Deep into that year my brother began to have episodes of repeated seizures. When this happened, I had to awaken our downstairs neighbor and ask to use her phone so that I could call 911 (or whatever its equivalent was sixty-five years ago). She did not once complain. When the ambulance arrived, I accompanied my father and my unconscious brother to Coney Island Hospital. There I went through the usual routine of being my father’s ears and voice. But in this situation I was also the voice and ears of my unconscious brother.
I instinctively knew that my father hated being in this situation, helpless because of his deafness. And the unthinking, uncaring, unsympathetic treatment he received from the hospital staff—all of them, from ambulance driver to orderly to nurse and doctor—was deeply painful to him. Not one of them had a moment for my father. I, on the other hand, was the center of their attention. As an adult with children of my own, I can very well imagine the humiliation my father must have felt at those times: ignored and dismissed as if he were a child of no consequence, while I was spoken to almost as the parent of my little brother.
My brother’s epileptic seizures were to last for five years, gradually diminishing in frequency. During that time he drank a daily concoction of powerful sedatives—including phenobarbital—which transformed him into a virtual zombie. And although he entered school at the appropriate age, he never seemed to be fully aware of what was going on in his classes; he always seemed to be sleepwalking. As he told me many years later about his school years, “I just didn’t get it.” How could he, drugged into oblivion by sedatives that would never be prescribed for an epileptic child today?
Eventually my brother’s seizures ceased. But by then my mother’s heart was broken.
M y own feelings toward my brother were complex. From the age of nine, my age at the time my brother’s seizures began, until I discovered the escape that high school football afforded me, my love for my brother was infused with resentment for his ceaseless need of me. He was never merely my younger brother—that could never be, because of the sticky web of responsibility in which I was forever entangled. Almost from the moment he was born I was responsible for “minding” him. That meant that my primary focus was on him and not on me; on his needs, not mine. Needs that in my mother’s and father’s eyes, of necessity, took precedence over mine. With the onset of his epileptic seizures, my needs were not merely overlooked—they were obliterated.
And, of course, my brother was my complete responsibility at night.
As he grew older, I was tasked not only with teaching him how to speak but acting as translator between him and our parents. In time he acquired a basic proficiency in sign language from casual instructions from our parents. But for much of our childhood, the more complex flow of language between them and him was through me.
My first language had been sign. Because of me, my brother’s first language would be spoken. When he was a baby, I thought it would be fun to get him to speak. But soon it became work. During his acquisition of spoken language, it was my responsibility to keep my parents abreast of his progress. After all, being deaf, how could they possibly know if my tutelage was succeeding?
I loved my brother and felt deeply sorry for him, but I experienced his
Deep into that year my brother began to have episodes of repeated seizures. When this happened, I had to awaken our downstairs neighbor and ask to use her phone so that I could call 911 (or whatever its equivalent was sixty-five years ago). She did not once complain. When the ambulance arrived, I accompanied my father and my unconscious brother to Coney Island Hospital. There I went through the usual routine of being my father’s ears and voice. But in this situation I was also the voice and ears of my unconscious brother.
I instinctively knew that my father hated being in this situation, helpless because of his deafness. And the unthinking, uncaring, unsympathetic treatment he received from the hospital staff—all of them, from ambulance driver to orderly to nurse and doctor—was deeply painful to him. Not one of them had a moment for my father. I, on the other hand, was the center of their attention. As an adult with children of my own, I can very well imagine the humiliation my father must have felt at those times: ignored and dismissed as if he were a child of no consequence, while I was spoken to almost as the parent of my little brother.
My brother’s epileptic seizures were to last for five years, gradually diminishing in frequency. During that time he drank a daily concoction of powerful sedatives—including phenobarbital—which transformed him into a virtual zombie. And although he entered school at the appropriate age, he never seemed to be fully aware of what was going on in his classes; he always seemed to be sleepwalking. As he told me many years later about his school years, “I just didn’t get it.” How could he, drugged into oblivion by sedatives that would never be prescribed for an epileptic child today?
Eventually my brother’s seizures ceased. But by then my mother’s heart was broken.
M y own feelings toward my brother were complex. From the age of nine, my age at the time my brother’s seizures began, until I discovered the escape that high school football afforded me, my love for my brother was infused with resentment for his ceaseless need of me. He was never merely my younger brother—that could never be, because of the sticky web of responsibility in which I was forever entangled. Almost from the moment he was born I was responsible for “minding” him. That meant that my primary focus was on him and not on me; on his needs, not mine. Needs that in my mother’s and father’s eyes, of necessity, took precedence over mine. With the onset of his epileptic seizures, my needs were not merely overlooked—they were obliterated.
And, of course, my brother was my complete responsibility at night.
As he grew older, I was tasked not only with teaching him how to speak but acting as translator between him and our parents. In time he acquired a basic proficiency in sign language from casual instructions from our parents. But for much of our childhood, the more complex flow of language between them and him was through me.
My first language had been sign. Because of me, my brother’s first language would be spoken. When he was a baby, I thought it would be fun to get him to speak. But soon it became work. During his acquisition of spoken language, it was my responsibility to keep my parents abreast of his progress. After all, being deaf, how could they possibly know if my tutelage was succeeding?
I loved my brother and felt deeply sorry for him, but I experienced his
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