Personal Narrative: My Two Days Of Being Deaf

I learned a few things on my two days of being deaf. I used earplugs to help me not hear otherwise it didn’t feel authentic to me. A lot of stuff makes sounds that I never noticed before until I didn’t hear them, like my own footsteps on the tile floor, or my cat who I talk to a lot and he meows back in response. I never really noticed this stuff because it was the norm.
Everything else that morning was somewhat normal, it was different eating breakfast in total silence; usually I have loud music or a TV on. Then to try to play a video game, which proved impossible because noise is essential to not being killed. So I sat around for a while watching TV with captions.
Then around lunch I went out with some friends and that was an odd experience

because when I told them what I was doing (I wrote it down) they started to treat me like I was dumb. Leading me around, using exaggerated hand gestures or even speaking loud, this didn’t help because ear plugs nowadays do a great job of keeping sound out. We texted and wrote notes to talk, and for the most part it was normal, though it seems, my charm and sarcasm is better when I can hear and speak.
I went home and took a nap. Then that night (Saturday night) I went to chalkies in Merritt Island. It was actually kind of nice to not hear all the crap happening in the bar. Though it was still a little weird communicating with friends, and I had to have help ordering drinks. Then I went home to bed.
Sunday is the day I sleep all day. I slept until 5 pm and got up, went out to dinner with friends to taco bell. The communication was slightly better just because I had one friend who has a deaf uncle so he knew not to treat me like I was stupid. I still had to have help ordering since I couldn’t speak. We wrote notes and texted to communicate. After I went home, me and my grandma went to Walmart. It was weird walking into Walmart and there being no sound. It is usually very loud with a dull roar noise. I liked it better not hearing though because I didn’t have to hear the random family’s yelling at the children or the babies crying. I spent the rest of the night watch captioned TV.
I learned a lot, like if you can’t hear people treat you like you’re dumb, which is weird because they don’t have anything to do with each other. At the same time I learned that I am very very glad that I was given the surgery I had when I was seven that saved my hearing. Otherwise I would be deaf and I wouldn’t be able to play certain games or listen to music.

But I am probably going to always wear earplugs in Walmart.