Social media influencer Emily tells us about advocating for all things deaf related online! (BSL)

Hi! I’m Emily, I’m 18 and I am from Scotland. I am also profoundly deaf and wear bilateral cochlear implants. I’m currently in my last year of secondary school and in my free time I love to spread deaf awareness on my Instagram account @ems_cochlear_life, sharing all things deaf related and BSL.

I was born fully hearing, but as the years went on, I began to lose my hearing at the age of 3, and by the time I reached 4 I had lost my hearing completely.

My parents had to fight for my diagnosis as in the beginning professionals told them I had ‘forgotten how to hear”. When I finally got my diagnosis I was given hearing aids, but they stopped benefitting me.

At that point my parents were encouraged to look into cochlear implants as my speech, language, and communication were starting to suffer. In 2010 I was accepted for cochlear implants and underwent the surgery in September, which was the start of an amazing journey to access sound.

Along the way I attended speech and language therapy and my parents tried to help me learn small amounts of BSL, but I always resorted back to speech, which is now my main form of communication. I look back on my journey and I’m so thankful that my parents went ahead with this life changing decision as I love them!

I decided to start up my Instagram page as I was inspired by others who were also doing the same thing, whilst also wanting to build my own confidence up along the way. On my Instagram I post educational, real life and relatable content as well as a place for others my age to feel included.

Overall, I’ve had a very positive and supportive response from the public! Starting up social media has helped me to connect with many other deaf teens my age, and many parents of deaf children have also reached out for support and advice, which has allowed me to give parents reassurance that their child being deaf isn’t at all bad!

Ever since I was young I’ve always had a love for sport, so when I got my cochlear implants my mum found it difficult to find a sport that I could do that worked well with them. I tried swimming but it didn’t work out as at the time the waterproof kit for the implants was not as advanced as today which meant I struggled to hear the instructor.

I also tried trampolining which I enjoyed but the thrust of the trampoline always threw my implants off my head, so when it came to competitions I struggled.

However, my mum got in touch with Scottish disability sport who put me in contact with an athletics team who had experience with other disabilities and were keen to take deaf awareness training!

This is when my love of running developed and I now train with a sprints team. Another thing I love to do is learning new songs in sign language as I find it helps me to learn new BSL signs along the way.

A lot of people just assume that once you have a cochlear implant, you can hear straight away and everything else is straight forward, but it’s not all smooth sailing.

In fact, there is a lot more that comes with listening through cochlear implants than people realise like lip reading, fatigue, social anxiety of not hearing conversations, feeling lonely and left out. Although these are some frustrations there are many positives that outweigh these negatives.

Sadly I have experienced discrimination and prejudice in my life. I remember one time specifically when I was in an afterschool club where a leader said to my mum “she should be able to hear better than any of us with those things on her head” as I didn’t respond to them after they were shouting from across the playground.

I was too young to understand what this fully meant. My mum explained to the leader that it was quite the opposite, especially from the other side of a playground. Although this was years ago, it just shows that hearing people don’t have a full understanding of cochlear implants.

I hope that society starts to understand that having deafness/cochlear implants doesn’t mean a lack of ability. Many people often underestimate deaf people and their abilities which I find frustrating as its absolutely not true! With the right support deaf people can achieve anything they set their mind to.

I would love for the government to make everyday things accessible for deaf people, by giving those who use BSL access to the services they need, and just providing more support in general.

I am currently in my last few months of Secondary school, and I’ve recently got accepted to study British Sign Language (interpreting, translating and applied language studies) at university! My main end goal is to work with deaf and implanted children, and to help make a difference to their cochlear implant journey through my own experiences, whether that be through audiology or rehabilitation.

What advice would I give to any young deaf people struggling with their deafness/cochlear implant?  I would say definitely try and surround yourself with the deaf community, whether that be chatting to a deaf community online or going to deaf youth clubs.

I attended deaf youth clubs a lot when I was younger and still do now and found them really beneficial! The youth clubs and deaf events/camps were surrounded by people just like me who understood what it was like which made me feel less alone and helped to improve my confidence.

I was also able to discover more about my own deaf identity, as well as getting to interact with people who have different levels of deafness where some use BSL and others use speech.

You can follow Emily on her Instagram account @ems_cochlear_life.