Listen to the Kids

The summer after my freshman year at ND, I did a summer service project in Louisville, KY. I lived in Floyd's Knob, IN, with an alumni family, whose names I cannot remember, but whose kindness stays with me.

Our job was difficult. The project was work in a residential children's home, and all of the children were recovering from, or right in the midst of, trauma. It was during this summer that I learned about the legalities of terminating parental rights. I learned about physical restraint (used only, sparingly, when a child posed a danger to themselves). I learned about home + how to create semblances of it in impossible surroundings. This was also the summer that I learned, definitively, that I was losing my hearing.

There was a little girl at the home who shared my name. She was a force. All these years later, I can still hear her voice. It was gravelly and Southern, but still somehow young. It was demanding. She was demanding. She wanted my time, and energy, and I wanted to give it to her. It tore at me that the nature of our relationship, all of her relationships, was marked by the impermanence, but it also helped me to be present.

One day, she grabbed my chin with her hands, and demanded, "Miss Christina, why don't you ever listen to me?" More than annoyed, I was shocked.

I had been listening--or trying to--I had no idea I was missing her words.

That afternoon, on my way home from work, I drove myself to a strip mall hearing aid store, and got a test.

Where this maybe gets tricky, is that I had suspected that I was losing my hearing for years. My pediatrician told me it was likely allergies. Another doctor prescribed steroids. Not one believed that I could actually be deaf, and not one of them simply tested me.

For a long time, I wondered how it could have gotten so bad without receiving validation. Now, I remember with clarity the ways that I was asking--demanding--to be taken seriously.

This isn't a post about doctors. I've had many lovely providers since. It's also not a listen to your soul kind of post. When the noise of your socio-cultural experience is loud, that can be almost impossible.

But, this is a listen to the kids post. In whatever way that you "listen." They are telling us so much. They are noticing, and feeling, around us, shining light into the places that we're not ready to go. Their witness is transformative, and they will lead us. What are the kids in your school community telling you?