My name is Stefanie. And I am a WODA.
Not to be confused with YODA. He is the Jedi Master who is very old....almost 900, talks in broken English, is extremely small in stature, has standout-ish ears and is green. I am definitely not a YODA.
No, I am a WODA. Wife Of Deaf Adult.
We are very unique, my kind. And like Jedi's we are not many. Once we have found one another, we kinda like to stick together.
In my lifetime, I have met a few fellow WODA's. They have become dear, lifelong friends. These are the kind of friends who you can hang out with all the time because 1) their spouse is deaf and can entertain Hubs for hours at a time, 2) everyone signs and 3) they are the only people who can totally relate to my life's experience.
Don't misunderstand, I have great non-WODA friends. Many who are just as dear to my heart.
But when a WODA reads these posts, she will laugh. Not because I am funny, well...that too, but because she too has had to do the drive through ordering. She too has had to interpret a movie or two. She too has had to deal with ignorance. Yup, she has been there and can completely understand. Completely.
We have a culture all of our own. We don't completely fit into the hearing world because even though we are hearing ourselves, our other half is not. So in order to hang out with non-signers, we lose ourselves in translation. We don't completely fit into the Deaf world because we can hear.
But when I am with another WODA, I have a place. I am understood.
My name is Stefanie and I am a WODA.
WODAn't you like to be a WODA too?
8 comments:
This is cute :) I'm not a WODA though but I can relate to the whole finding-friends-who-you-can-relate-to thing. That's mostly because I'm an expat wife/mother and there is a pretty nice little community for us here in Tokyo... Mostly because Japanese wife/mothers tend to exclude us from playdates and such because of our inability to speak Japanese and do other things.
So yay to you and your WODA friends! It's nice to have people who understand what it's like to be married to a Deaf Adult :)
even though I am not a WODA, I think you are pretty funny.
Woman Of Definitive Awesomeness?
Well, I think it's a bit too late for me to join the WODA ranks, but if I had it all to do over again....
;)
i'm kind of like a yoda...short chunky and talk in chopped sentences. just ask my hubs
Can you kick someone's trash like Yoda in Episode 2? Because if that is one of the side benefits of being a WODA, that would be AWESOME!
I'd imagine that this is comprabile to my driving a right hand drive car, but on a larger scale.
Only the other postal peeps understand that I can not go through the drive thru windows, why I can't merge with traffic coming from the left, and why when I back into a parking space, I am not doing the reverse like every ones else, but rather the reverse of the reverse. It is also the reason why, I have a lovely tan on my right side, and as pale as God made me on the other. :)
I'm a WOBA (Wife of Blind Adult) I can completely understand. I haven't been able to find any other women in my situation yet. I imagine it's wonderful when you do though!
I think this WODA is as wise as YODA!!
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