[diceydeals]

[Image Description: a meme which has a painting of Greek philosophers who are talking, gesturing, and carrying books on one side which is labeled "Talking about disability with disabled people", and across from that is a photo of an adult showing a toddler a toy labeled "Talking about disability with abled people." End ID/]

[diceydeals]

Hearing and History

12th April 2023

So, I recently found out that my level of hearing is a lot lower than I thought it was and probably always has been.

What does this mean? Basically I probably would've benefited from hearing aids and learning sign language as a child rather than relying on self-taught lip-reading, guesswork, and asking people to repeat themselves/be patient.

Let me tell you, people are not always good at being patient.

I have very mixed feelings about this. Listening is very tiring, and I have always said this! I couldn't do mental maths questions because they were on a tape recording. Ditto language listening and oral exams, which I kept failing at school. French was nearly impossible for me because I cannot hear the words or make sense of the month movements. Thank gd for Spanish!

I didn't have a hearing test until I was in secondary school. That policy has changed now in the NHS so hearing loss is picked up very soon after birth. Basically, there were a bunch of points in my life when someone could have intervened to give me the tools to navigate the world rather than just let me figure it out.

I am not part of the Deaf community. I don't know anybody my age who is hard of hearing or deaf. My family thought it was 'normal' because my mum, her sister, and my grandad all have hearing loss. I was teased for being deaf while simultaneously nobody taking the implications of my deafness seriously. It was a lose-lose situation. Essentially, it wasn't that I wasn't deaf enough, it was that it didn't effect me obviously enough for anyone to do anything.

Now I have hearing aids, I can hear music, I can hear lyrics. I can hear (although not focus on) multiple conversations. Birds are insanely fucking loud. Projectors and air-conditioning drive me up the wall. My tinnitus is definitely worse, but that may also be a side effect of long covid (apparently that's a thing). It's a wild experience that I'm still getting used to, a year later.

I would still love to learn sign language. But now's not a great time: I'm tired, working and studying full-time, recovering from covid, and generally have shit going on. British Sign Language lessons are expensive in person, but learning online is something I'd rather avoid as I can't concentrate easily. This means more travel, more money, more time, more energy. This means I have to wait.

I wish I could've had the chance to learn when I was first diagnosed.

TLDR; just because you can work to the point of exhaustion to fit the needs of the world, doesn't mean you should have to! You deserve accommodations. The world needs to bend so that people don't break.

[diceydeals]

crash

[diceydeals]

crab 🦀

[diceydeals]

hearing aids day 1 (2nd march 2022)

crunchy

loud

lots wow just so many sounds

Ss!!! so much sibilance, oof is that annoying - might develop a lisp in preemptive retaliation/ self-defence

see also: whispering really carries

i can hear my hair and i am not happy about it

scratchy staticky sounds from hair moving, jaw opening/closing, breathing

does the air make sound??? i am confused

i feel high oh my gods on earth

too much behind the ear - ow

masks are a fucking pain right now

voice sounds funny, very conscious of every sound i make - just existing creates so much noise

under water at the cinema - loud crisp too much but also aware of thing in my ear, layer between me and the world, every slightly unreal and held at a distance

spooky

disorienting

music - especially classical so far but haven't tested much - everything else stops/ disappears/takes a back seat - andres rieu ftw - it's incredible, just entrancing and all-ecompassing, holy shit

my voice may change in relation to this (avoid s sounds, lower pitch and volume, kinda drawly because i can hear myself and it slows me down, usually speak very quickly)

everything is sooooo distracting!!!! the world is happening all around me

bereft when i took them out the first time, where has the world gone? everything so dim and distant, genuinely might cry

honestly kinda high key relieved after i took them out the second time jesus wept did i need a break

very tiring but in a different way from how straining not being able to hear is tiring - just so much new stuff to process! brain making ALL the connections wowzer oh boy

did i mention crunchy? because yeah if i could pick one word that'd be it, we're going iceberg lettuce on this

CRONCH

[diceydeals]

I learn things for the people I love

[diceydeals]

*sees another human being*

> experience the end of days

[diceydeals]

/

A tree is growing

In a place it shouldn't be;

But it's beyond me.

/

AKB 2020

[diceydeals]

Rock Climbing

/

Bruised knees purple like my nail varnish,

chipped and jagged like the fingers of mountains

carressing the clouds,

callouses where I grip at the rock face like it's your hand.

I hold myself up on you but my wrists ache and my arms spasm and I fall.

You are not my safety mat.

Not basecamp but heady heights.

I climb and retreat. You are unmoved.

There is no give when I crash into you.

No mitigating yourself for my presence.

I cannot live my life where you are.

The air too thin, the sights so dizzy, the light bright enough to make my eyes blink

and I have to look away.

No space for mortals in these craggy halls open under the sky.

Just the risk of exposure. No tent,

No shelter here.

/

AKB 2020

[diceydeals]

Words From Before

/

Women power my body:

they are neither consumed for calories

- eat their love and labour -

nor burned for fuel on pyres

- their bodies have always fueled hatred -

yet they are the force behind

every action, each choice.

/

My mitochondria: powerhouse of the cell.

We consist of cells and stars and oceans;

we subsist on truth and tales and lies.

My mother told me I have in me

my grandmothers' mitochondria

- I don't know who told her -

but she wants to believe it so I believe it too

- my mother told me so I want it to be true...

/

Being a woman is just:

[inherits mother's dreams and trauma][inherits grandmother's trauma and mitochondria][inherits great-grandmother's dreams and trauma][inherits]

...

I never research for poems or I start writing essays;

I just listen to my elders,

listen to my ancestors,

and get lost there instead.

Listen to my self and my body and the 'verse.

/

In the shower I let my body be

itself

its curves not hidden by tucks and layers,

not displayed in heels and high-waisted jeans,

not stuffed into bras

and smuggled into knickers;

I just let the water run, let my calloused hands smooth my soft body, wash and stroke away the hurts I've caused.

My hair tangles, it wants to be short.

But my body just is

as it is

as it is.

/

Powered by the mitochondria of my grandmothers

and their grandmothers

and theirs

and the 'verse.

/

AKB 2020

[diceydeals]

TIME IS THE FOURTH DIMENSION

WE'RE ALL HERE WORKING IN 4D LIKE IT'S 3030

[diceydeals]

"That's my psychological support husband!"

- actual quote from my mother who has no clue about memes or the internet or but sir, that's my emotional support anything... so,,, I guess everyone now and then humans go and reinvent well know tumblr phrases huh?

[diceydeals]

/

what do I do when I disappear?

instagram is empty

and the devils are here

/

AKB 2019

[diceydeals]

" • "

" • "

" • "

" • "

" • "

" • "

" • "

Fireworks in Space

/

Speak pride to power:

Show truth and love and magic;

Into the void, let colour flow

Where once only lies tried to fill the vacuum.

There is no air here.

We bring our own oxygen, and enough to share.

You try to set us on fire,

We laugh and burn and fizz and dance,

We are the sparks,

You gave us fuel.

Fool.

/

AKB 2019

[diceydeals]

Day 8: Frail. Except nah, frail has too much of weakness in it for me, so actually let's use fragile instead. Because breakable doesn't mean broken, and broken doesn't mean unfixable. Not so much a Plot Twist as a loop-the-loop going on with the haiku. And yep, it's late for Inktober! Start where you can, stories are circles.

/

HELL yeah I'm fragile.

As a fucking FREIGHT TRAIN, girl.

Made brittle by rust.

/

AKB 2019

Photo reference here:

Railroads, Chicago-style

Milwaukee Road freight train along York Road in Bensenville, Illinois Caption: “It’s well below zero December 1977 one of the worst winters

[diceydeals]

Day 7: Enchanted. No longer sure why my brain catalogued this as Extremely Urgent To Be Written Down Immediately falling asleep a week ago but I have done as commanded by forces beyond my control in the realms of my subconscious. Perhaps I was unwittingly enchanted...

/

ENCHANTED NUMBERS

FALL INTO PLACE LIKE GRAVESTONES;

TRAGIC AND HEAVY.

/

AKB 2019

[diceydeals]

Thoughts on coming out

/

What I thought would happen, or, what happened every other damned time I tried to tell you:

Sit in the pit of my stomach

Get stuck in the tunnel of my throat

Lodge in the chasm of my mouth

Prickle and weigh on my tongue

Press against the blockade of my teeth

And finally,

Mangled and aching,

Shredded and bleeding,

Pummeled and pulsing,

Emerge

Changed

On my lips

Like cracked skin and warm breath

As words.

The wrong fucking words.

What actually happened:

I said it, downplayed it.

You dismissed me, and kissed me.

You still want me. You don't know me.

The response too easy; now I'm waiting for it to sink in.

How the hell do I show it, own it, glow with it

When I don't feel any

Pride.

You didn't listen.

/

AKB 2019

[diceydeals]

Day 6: Husky. Getting my flu jab next week! Vaccinate yourself and your kids, people! Been out in the rain all week and haven't got sick yet so long may that luck last, but I ain't about to rely on something so fickle when the wonders of Science!™ can help me.

Also, Calpol makes me nostalgic, so, yeah...

/

Her voice husky with

Flu season and cigarettes -

Drink your medicine!

/

AKB 2019