Every family works a little differently and we should generally be careful about sticking our noses into situations that may work for others just because they don’t work for us.
But at the same time, there’s a difference between an unorthodox family and one that is clearly harming one of its members.
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Whether we’re talking about an old school parenting style that’s only revealing more of its flaws with age or a case where parents are trying to fit their children into a box they don’t belong in, it’s often not hard to spot an unhappy household when you spend enough time in one.
But of course, when you’re brought up in it, it can sometimes be hard to tell that what you’re experiencing is neither healthy nor normal.
And as one woman did after a series of unusual arguments with her parents, those who are starting to question things will sometimes turn to outside observers to see if they’re wrong to feel the way they do.
When the woman we’ll be hearing about was 18, she experienced an accident that left her with a traumatic brain injury.
As she explained in a Reddit post , this made her lose most of her hearing in both ears.
And since there’s nothing that cochlear implants can do about her specific from of deafness, it’s something she’ll simply have to live with.
But while this uprooted her life and made her depressed for a long time, she now feels content with her life at age 26 after discovering the deaf community and learning American Sign Language.
But while she’s adjusted to her new life, it’s eminently clear to her that the same can’t be said of her parents.
In the years since she’s embraced being deaf, she’s asked her parents if they would also learn ASL, but was told that they didn’t have time to learn a new language.
And on many occasions since then, she’s tried to give them information about ASL or deafness in general only to be shown little interest.
And from the sounds of things, it’s not as if ASL wouldn’t be needed because the woman and her parents often struggle to communicate.
She explained that they largely talk by using voice-to-text programs on their phones, which are a little glitchy at the best of times and very confusing when multiple people are trying to talk at once.
It’s even worse in person, as the woman finds it difficult to keep up with her family’s conversations and will either be ignored or yelled at for not following along as a result.
Furthermore, despite the fact that they often watch movies together, she often won’t know what’s going on because her parents find the captions so annoying that they refuse to turn them on.
So after another frustrating Christmas together, the woman sat her parents down and explained that if they didn’t make an effort to learn ASL, she would stop visiting them for a very long time.
As she put it, “I just can’t do any more visits where my presence feels like a burden.”
And while she’s not expecting fluency, she doesn’t see how their relationship can work if her parents don’t at least make a serious effort.
In her words, “I told them that they have continuously dismissed my needs as a deaf person, and that if they want to continue to have a meaningful relationship with me, we need to have some kind of shared language.”
This prompted her parents to accuse her of trying to cut them off and her brother to tell her she’s being hugely unfair.
And while her friends — most of whom are also deaf — support her, she wanted to see what others among “the hearing ” thought.
When she did, it became obvious that she wasn’t even remotely at fault here.
As one user said , “No, THEY are being unfair. Also, they either can’t or don’t want to learn ASL. Either way, you cannot keep accommodating them when they do NOTHING to accommodate YOU.”
In the words of another person, “The fact that they won’t even turn on CAPTIONS for you to help you feel included shows how reluctant they are to put in any effort.”
h/t: Reddit | basketsoftough
