Insight: I broke up with my hearing boyfriend because he wouldn’t accept my deaf world (BSL)

As I head towards the end of my 20s, I naturally wonder if I’ll be married and with a family of my own by the time I am 30. At the time of writing this I am single and happy, yet with lots of thoughts and reflections in my mind that I wanted to share.

I class myself as being bilingual, I can speak and communicate in English well but I am also a sign language user. I have both deaf and hearing friends.

My hearing friends are from work and the hobbies that I do – such as my running club. And my deaf friends are mostly from the same school we attended and we live quite close to each other in the same county too.

I don’t think it’s an issue to have hearing and deaf friends, I would never choose one group over the other because they all make up part of my social circle.

Earlier this year I went abroad for a hen weekend for a lady that I work with. While I was there I met a man who I discovered lives within half an hour of me back home. We hit it off straight away and I really felt attracted to him.

He was funny, good looking and didn’t seem phased by my hearing devices or when I told him I was deaf. The fact that he said “he wouldn’t have known” and that “I didn’t sound deaf” should have been red flags indicating his lack of awareness. But I enjoyed our time together and we promised to have further dates when we both got back to England.

At first, everything went well but I soon realised that whenever we met it was always on his terms, around his hearing friends or at places he was already familiar with.

After a fair few dates at the traditional places like restaurants and bars where I was doing a hell of a lot of intense lip reading, I invited him to come along to a gathering with my deaf friends so he could have a glimpse of the other side of my world.

I suggested he learn a few signs for my friends and straight away I noticed his reluctance. He said he felt embarrassed and “wouldn’t everyone lipread anyway” like I did?

I persuaded him to come along but as soon as we arrived I knew he hated it. He stiffened at the sight of so many people signing and despite knowing a few signs that I’d taught him, he continued to speak to everyone, even into their ears when they hugged him as a welcome greeting. I was cringing and I knew my friends would pick up on it.

We had planned to have drinks then move onto another place for food but after 30 minutes of ignoring conversations and tapping on his phone he turned to me and muttered an excuse about needing to leave. He kissed me on the cheek and left, not even apologising or waving to my friends.

Of course my friends and I thought the whole thing was rude and odd. The next time we met up I challenged him about it and he said he didn’t think he needed to meet up with those friends with me in future because of the “deafness issue.”

I remember feeling shocked by what he was saying. I asked him if he realised that I was also deaf. He said yes but I wasn’t “as deaf as them.”

How did he know? Had he seen my audiogram and theirs?

I should have listened to the warning signs that were there all along. He showed zero interest in sign language or learning about deaf culture. He didn’t ask me any questions about my deafness. He expected me to lipread all the time and speak all the time.

I tried to explain a couple of more times after that about the deaf world and how I am bilingual and fit in both, but he was just adamant that he could only fit in with one half of my friends and one half of my life.

Unsurprisingly we called things a day soon after. I refuse to be with someone who doesn’t accept my deafness and the full version of my world.

If I wasn’t so strong minded and if I didn’t have a good support network from deaf friends, maybe I could have been fooled into hiding myself away from any deaf people in order to keep a boyfriend.

But trust me – nobody is worth sacrificing half your life for!

This blog has been written anonymously as part of the Insight series where readers are invited to share their story or news about their interesting job with The Limping Chicken. If you have a story to share please email rebecca@rawithey.com

Image courtesy of i-stock photos.