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If I'd been born into a hearing family and went to a public school, I would have probably felt much more isolated, and being deaf would have become my identity.

Own your identity. Love who you are in the world. Love your deafness.

I was raised by a single black deaf woman, so I am as independent as they come.

There are people who are born deaf and grow up deaf who don't speak at all, and some of them have told me that they resent a little bit that I do speak. But, you know, I have to be myself. I have to do what I'm comfortable doing.

I was born deaf. Sound never existed in my life, and this is completely normal to me.

I am fourth-generation deaf, which means everyone in my immediate family is deaf. So I grew up always having 100 percent accessibility to language and communication, which was wonderful and something so many deaf people don't have.

Growing up, I was always involved in the deaf community.

I am the fourth generation of being deaf.

But people who think they can project themselves into deafness are mistaken because you can't. And I'm not talking about imagining what a deaf person's whole life is like I even mean just realizing what it is like for an instant.