MayaThe Life of the Party

Paintings, drawings, and awards cover the walls of Maya’s house. The seven-year-old artist loves expressing herself with crayons and paints. She loves expressing herself with words, too. But when she was born, her parents didn’t think they would ever hear her speak. Maya was born profoundly deaf to hearing parents.

After understanding all the possible communication outcomes, Elsa and Teney chose Listening and Spoken Language (LSL) for their daughter. “We wanted her to be like us. She comes from a listening and hearing family and I wanted her, my kid, to be like her parents, her siblings, and her extended family,” said Elsa. “There’s nothing wrong with any other choices, but the bottom line is that I wanted my kid to be as much like our family as she can be.” At four months old, Maya received her first hearing aids.

Now, the high-spirited and creative little girl has cochlear implants and communicates fluently with her parents, little brother, and extended family in spoken English. She even speaks a few words of the native Indian language used by her parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. “We communicate in more than one language in our family,” said Elsa. “I want Maya to have access to that. We’re from India. I want her to be proud of that. That’s part of who she is, too.” Her hearing technology and LSL have helped Maya explore her Indian culture and connect with her family around the world.

“When she was really young, I introduced her as ‘this is my child with hearing loss. Her name is Maya.’ That was my leading information and I thought that was the most important thing about her,” said Elsa. “But as I’ve become educated and as I’ve gotten to learn about her and hearing loss, I’ve realized that this is Maya and she has a hundred things about her and hearing loss is only one of them.”