# @davidmsmith15 on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/B5c4AS1BzdX
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/29187731-davidmsmith15-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/33cbb92835.jpg
- **Posted:** 2019-11-29T13:33:49.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** David Smith 🇺🇸 (@davidmsmith15) — https://gondola.cc/davidmsmith15

## Caption

Over my years as a professional volleyball player I have received countless DMs from other hard-of-hearing people, sharing their own stories with me and asking questions about my experiences as a deaf athlete. I want to share a series of posts over the next few weeks, exploring my personal journey through life as a hard-of-hearing person. A collection of thoughts and stories that might give you more of a glimpse into how I confront, adapt, struggle, and at times, triumph as a deaf person. A lot of stories will relate to my athletic journey, as volleyball has been a huge part of my life, but they will also touch on the more ordinary parts of my life, like my relationship with my family and friends.
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So, to start things off, some background on my hearing disability. I was born with severe-to-profound hearing loss in both ears, likely caused by a combination of damage and/or underdevelopment to the auditory nerve and middle ear. Without my hearing aids, I can only hear 10-20% of “normal” decibels. I have been wearing some form of BTE (behind the ear) hearing aids since I was 3 years old. In everyday conversations, I rely heavily on lip-reading, meaning I need to be able to see a person’s face while they are talking in order to use both visual and auditory cues to “hear” what is being said. All that to say, I don’t know life apart from being deaf. It has been a “cloud” that is always over my life, but I have learned that just because there is a cloud in the sky, it doesn’t mean you can’t see the sun and a whole lot of clear blue sky around it.
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I look forward to sharing more about this part of my life, and would love to hear from you what questions you may have, or what specific aspects you might want me to share more about. .
#deafathlete #deaf #hardofhearing #hearing #deafcommunity #deafawareness #hearingloss #volleyballplayer #oticon #myoticon #usavolleyball #TeamAdidas #Adidasvolleyball #Adidasathlete
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oticonusa oticonpeoplefirst adidasvolleyball adidas usavolleyball

## Stats

- **Views:** 0
- **Likes:** 3,093
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- **Comments:** 60

## Tags

usavolleyball, teamadidas, volleyballplayer, deafathlete, hardofhearing, oticon, deaf, deafcommunity, hearing, myoticon, adidasvolleyball, hearingloss, adidasathlete, deafawareness

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