Jordan Ochel: Part of a Bigger World

E462 Jordan Ochel was born deaf and was raised in the “oralist” tradition (without Sign Language). His recently wrote and directed Healing Hands for his graduate thesis short film. The film is based on his experiences as a binaurally deaf child, including a night in 1991 when he was taken to a Benny Hinn “Miracle Crusade” […]

Episode Transcript

(00:08):
Hey, humans. How's it going?
Susan Ruth here. Thanks for listening to another
episode
of Hey, Human podcast.
This is episode 462,
and my guest is Jordan Okell.
Born deaf, Jordan was raised in the oralist
tradition without sign language, which he'll explain more
about in this episode.

(00:28):
Jordan and I met in Waco at the
film festival there, where the film he wrote
and directed Healing Hands won best student short
film and best family short.
The film is based on his experiences
as a deaf child,
including a night when he was taken as
a child to a Benny Hinn miracle crusade

(00:50):
to be healed from his deafness.
I
met him at the award show of
the film
festival, and I just loved his vibe. And
we started chatting,
and he was very gracious to to come
on the show.
I need to say my vocal cord is
healing. I'm sound very scratchy.

(01:11):
It's a process.
I for those who don't know, I was
born with a paralyzed, striped vocal cord.
And
doctor
Johns here at Keck Medical Center in Los
Angeles is fantastic,
and he is
working to help make the left one not
have to work so hard by doing stuff
to the right one to fatten it up.
It will never move, but maybe we make

(01:32):
the left one not have to work so
hard. Anyway, that's why I'm scratchy voiced and
will be for quite a while. So bear
with me on the healing journey.
General stuff, check out Hey Human podcast for
links and to learn more about my guests
in the show.
Check out susanruth.com
to learn more about me and my other
artistic endeavors.
Follow susan ruthism on social media, and find

(01:54):
my music on Spotify, Apple Music,
Amazon Music, wherever you get your music.
Rate, review, and subscribe to Hey Human podcast
anywhere you get your podcasts. And actually wanted
to say, guess what? Blurby,
podcasts
made Hey Human its podcast of the month.
So thank you to y'all for that.

(02:16):
And, yeah,
be well, take care,
be kind, and here we go.
Jordan Okel, welcome to Hey Human.
Thank you so much, Susan. Good to see
you again.
It's so good to see you. We met
at Waco at the Independent Film Festival, and
I
was so delighted to be sitting next to

(02:37):
you because you kept winning awards, and it
was so exciting.
Oh, thank you so much. Yeah. It was
certainly humbling,
surprising.
I was just touched by it. So I
was honored to have you sit next to
me. It couldn't have happened to a nicer
person, so I was Thank you. Thrilled for
you. Let's a little bit dig into you
before we get into what you do now,

(02:58):
who you are, where were you raised up,
what was your family life like, how did
that shape you?
I am a native Texan. I was born
in, the Austin area, grew up there.
I had
a cup like, two and a half years
as a child where I lived in Illinois.
So I've experienced the the winters of the

(03:20):
North, but my family moved back down when
I was five or six. You know, I've
I've been living here most of my life.
My my wife is from Waco, so I've,
she and I have lived here for the
last, I don't know, twelve,
fifteen years, something like that. I can't count
anymore. So I've called Waco home since then.
As far as family life, I've had a

(03:41):
very loving family.
My family my parents live here in town,
and my wife's parents live here in town,
which is really helpful raising our daughter. You
know? It's good to have that extra help.
Do you have siblings?
I have one brother. I I love him
to death. He's a year and a half
younger.
He and his family
live in Europe right now. They they've been
living in Switzerland, but they're moving right now

(04:03):
to Germany. So excited for them. They're they're
having a great time.
Were you born with hearing difficulty? Were you
a hearing child that then developed some how
did that work out?
Yeah. So I was born deaf. My parents
didn't know it.
And that's deaf with a lowercase d. I
was raised in the
what's called the sort of, like, the oralist

(04:25):
tradition. It's not really a tradition, but the
oralist way of kind of living with deafness,
which is that you are taught to speak
and listen with hearing aids, with hearing devices
as opposed to being taught sign language. And
that's really common for better or worse, in
my opinion. I think all deaf and hard
of hearing children should be given the opportunity

(04:47):
to learn
both because
ASL is American Sign Language is
made for people like us, and and there's
a whole culture and community
of capital t deaf people. You know, they
their primary language is ASL. So I wasn't
blessed with that opportunity.
But, yeah, my my parents didn't know that
I was deaf for the first year and

(05:08):
a half of life. They just thought I
was struggling to speak or understand what was
being said. It wasn't until my dad walked
in after I was,
napping in my crib and I was facing
the wall away from the door and he
said my name and I didn't turn around
and he stepped closer and said it again
in about four or five different times until

(05:28):
he was right next to my ear, and
that's when I noticed him. They
took me to be seen by an audiologist,
was fitted with hearing aids,
and they were
told, you know, that
it was dangerous for me to hit my
head because I could lose my hearing more.
They were told that, you know, it's better
to raise me to learn how to speak

(05:50):
English as opposed to ASL.
And
because of all this, there was a real
stigma
around it,
a real sense of fear
in my parents.
And, you know, they they wanted nothing more
but the best for
to have give me the best life possible.
So that led to
my dad who was told by a friend,

(06:14):
about a famous televangelist named Benny Hinn, goes
around and has a big
healing faith healing,
we'll call it a show. They took me
to that, and I was selected as as
one of the
quote unquote, healing participants,
to come up on stage at age five.
And there were,

(06:35):
over 10,000 people
wanting me to be healed, and so I
lied and said that I was healed because
I didn't know what else to do.
And then the lie was up later that
night. And so that's what that's what inspired
my film that was at Waco Indy this
year. It wasn't until I started making that
film that I
really felt

(06:55):
the healing power of community,
people coming together to help me tell this
story, and it no longer feels like my
story. It feels like the character's story, and
it's just it's just amazing what art can
do.
As a kid,
did you feel broken?
Especially since everyone's trying to say,
no. No. You have to talk or you

(07:16):
have to pretend. Yeah. I definitely you know,
as a kid, I wouldn't have known to
verbalize it as feeling broken, but I definitely
did feel that way. Even today, I I
don't feel broken anymore,
I
don't
feel broken anymore, but even today, there's a
a stigma because
my my parents, my in laws, they
they've hesitated and and resisted getting hearing aids

(07:37):
when they really needed it. There's still a
sense of stigma in our culture about hearing
loss in their case, deafness in other cases,
when
there really shouldn't be any shame. There's there's
no difference between hearing aids and and glasses
for most people. So
it's just something that
aids in one of your five senses. So
I see that with my own parents and

(07:58):
even friends, and they there's this idea that
somehow
again, I use the word broken,
but such a good analogy is if you
can't see well, you get glasses.
Yeah. I think what
being deaf or hard of hearing,
in my opinion,
living this life has taught me is that

(08:19):
there's there's more than one way to live
a
perfectly normal, beautiful, healthy life, you know? And
it might not look like
the quote unquote average person,
but that doesn't mean I'm not living the
life I was meant to live or living
a life that I can enjoy living.
In fact, there are many benefits, in my
opinion, to the way that that I live

(08:40):
life. I go to sleep and take my
hearing aids out. I don't I don't hear
anything. You know, I
it no sound. It's it's wonderful. I don't
know how people go to sleep hearing
all the noises that they hear. I couldn't
do it. So there are benefits to it
as well.
Yeah. I can understand that desire to shut
out the world.

(09:00):
Yeah. Especially in the world today, it can
be helpful.
Do you speak sign language now?
I don't. I've attempted to learn more recently,
and then we we had a we had
a child and life kind of got away
from from us. And I have something I've
it's been on my bucket list to to
learn it more fluently.
I would love to learn from someone who

(09:23):
is is deaf and can and can teach
me directly, you know, learning directly from someone
who that is their first language. I hope
to pay for lessons at some point. You
know, on TikTok, I've noticed a
swell
of
deaf
content creators
or content creators who can't speak, who do

(09:45):
either I've seen American sign language and I've
seen British sign language. I don't know how
much different they are. I assume every country
has their own
language as Yeah. As one would. It's great.
It's great to see that because it tells
me that it is becoming more normalized
and Yeah.
And more in the zeitgeist. And, like, you
would go to school. I wish I'd had

(10:06):
that option as a kid. If there had
been sign language, what a cool option. Absolutely.
It's up this whole other world,
like any language.
I I am curious
as a person who is
completely deaf. How do you learn to make
the the words and the sounds? How much
do your hearing aids
articulate sound around you?

(10:28):
Yeah. So thank you for that question. Something
that I think people don't often
realize, because they they wouldn't have
much context to realize it, is that
just like any other way of living, there's
a lot there's a there's a spectrum. Right?
I happen to be

(10:49):
somebody that my
deafness is pretty
severe to profound. I have profound
deafness in my left ear and severe to
profound in my right. Pretty much close to
almost no hearing without hearing aids. In fact,
no hearing whatsoever in my left ear without
a hearing aid, basically.
And yet,

(11:10):
I get comments all the time
that,
I sound
like I'm not deaf. And
that comes across
you know, I take it as a compliment
from from their perspective
and and receive that in the way that
they mean it. But I I must have
some
mimicking ability. I don't know. I I worked

(11:32):
really hard as a child
to
I asked my mom to tell me, like,
when do when am I saying a word?
Like, what part of the word doesn't sound
right? And I would just practice until I
almost memorized
how it felt to say the words,
quote, unquote, correctly.
So there was all it's deceptive.

(11:52):
My speaking is deceptive for people because it
doesn't actually match
my hearing loss or deafness from an audiologist
perspective.
Whenever I get a new audiologist,
they
and they do the hearing test on me,
they're always surprised
because they weren't expecting it to be that

(12:13):
profound.
There are people with
less deafness than than I have,
and they don't speak as well as I
do. So, like, all of all of this
is a spectrum.
And it at the end of the day,
from my perspective,
we're all just
trying to communicate.

(12:35):
And,
yeah, I think sometimes people
get hung up on the way that they
sound or the way that someone else sounds
and not enough on
listening to what they're trying to say and
and who they seeing who they really are.
You know? Yeah. Like like you're doing, which
is wonderful.
Thanks.
When

(12:56):
you're speak when I talk,
when I speak,
I have
a voice that's happening in my head as
well as voice that's being projected outward.
And as someone who can't hear, do you
also and this may be the most ignorant
question in the whole world, but I'm curious.
Do you also do you hear a voice

(13:16):
in your head? How does Yes. Listen to
this vibration?
Yeah. No. I definitely hear a voice in
my head, and I think it's because of
the fact that I was raised to learn
how to speak.
I think if I had been
I I don't know. And I haven't asked
this question of someone who is capital d
deaf and and who doesn't wear hearing aids.

(13:37):
I know that they
they have reported that they dream in sign
language. You know?
They dream communicating in in sign language.
So I would also have to guess that
maybe they don't have an inner voice that's
an auditory one, but perhaps one that is
a sign language one. That's just a guess.
I I don't know that for certain, so

(13:59):
that's a big disclaimer there. But for me,
I do
hear a voice when
when I'm thinking or reading, and I I
hear in my dreams as well.
That was going to be one of my
questions, so I'm glad you brought it up.
I I was curious about that. I I
mean, it makes complete sense. Again,
I think there's a disconnect for myself as

(14:19):
well growing up of this idea that sign
language
is somehow other.
It's a weird thing because you can other
a person who's deaf. Yeah. That happens
because I think that it's perceived a certain
way.
But then also
the idea that this language is somehow other
when it's not.

(14:41):
Yeah.
Yeah. I am happy that, like, for example,
I did a TikTok when I first had
the procedure on my vocal cord.
I did a thing. I I did it
really quickly.
I said, hey. This is what's going on.
This is my voice. It's gonna be several
months before it returns to normal, hopefully.
Fingers crossed.

(15:02):
And
I didn't normally, I put captions
on my TikToks,
and I didn't for this one. And someone
in the comments said, hey.
I need captions. And I I was like,
oh, I'm a dick. Of course you do.
And so
it it it goes down to this idea

(15:22):
of it's like, yeah. That's that is a
no brainer.
It's just, of course, you do.
Mhmm. And that what's wrong with just like
I interviewed a woman who was who was
blind,
and I described what I was wearing and
what I looked like before we started the
interview. So she had a context in her
mind.
And it's

(15:42):
it's interesting how we place
ideas of things outside of the reality of
things for whatever reason, lack of understanding,
bigotry,
just confusion,
fear.
Yeah.
Yeah. Absolutely. And I think too what

(16:03):
you're you're you're touching on is there's almost
a fear that I I sense it sometimes
with some people. There's a fear that
they feel like they might say something
to offend me or or hurt my feelings
or ask they're not sure if a question
is appropriate. And
there there are definite I've I've talked with
deaf and and hard of hearing individuals who

(16:25):
do get touchy about questions or, you know,
things like that. But I've never
been I've I've always been appreciative when people
ask questions because
I see it as someone trying to
get to know me, get to know something
that's a part of me. You know? And
and there's not a lot of information out
there. I I even you know, I'll be

(16:47):
honest. Part of the reason I didn't learn
ASL as a child is
I felt the stigma so strongly that if
I learned ASL,
I would be
seen as deaf. In fact, I didn't embrace
the term deaf until
probably seventy eight years ago because I I
was always refer to myself as hard hard

(17:07):
of hearing
because I I've lived
in two worlds, and I and I didn't
want to think about living in two worlds.
I wanted people to see me as,
you know, quote unquote normal. And
I
I come to realize that I've only been
hurting myself by participating

(17:27):
in that that stigma and that fear. That's
part of why I didn't learn ASL is
I was I was resistant to
learning it because of that
stigma of being seen as deaf. Kinda got
away from what you were getting at, I
think. But You you get to pass through
the world on your own terms.
Mhmm. So if you start to use this
external language

(17:49):
all bets are off.
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.
And I I've had deaf people come up
to me and start signing, and there's there's
a shame on on the other side too
where I have to say, I'm so sorry.
I I don't know how
how to sign.
And they they come up with such excitement.
Oh, there's someone else in the world who
I can speak to, and and then I

(18:10):
have to
I have to let them down. So
there's there's sort of a pain on both
sides of the equation
there. And
that's why I'm I'm really appreciative when people
talk about this more with me when they
when they ask questions.
That's how we're gonna break down stigma, you
know, and make this world a better place

(18:31):
for the future generations.
And just one more thing. On closed captions,
I'm so glad that you
do that. I'm so glad that
even
hearing people of the younger generation, Gen z
and and now Gen Alpha. I've
seen it all over the place, read it
all over the place. They love watching with
captions on, and that makes me so happy

(18:53):
because
it makes it more accessible for for everybody.
You know? Yeah. To me, there's nothing distracting
about captions. In fact, it's helped my daughter
learn how to probably read quicker than some
of her peers because we watch with captions
on all the time. Yeah. And she can
associate.
Yeah.
Exactly.
And when we were at the table during

(19:13):
the awards ceremony of, where you got all
the awards, excitingly, so I when when I
sat down,
I realized I could tell by your eye
line that you were looking at my mouth.
Yes. And I was like, oh, okay. So
he reads lips. And I think I even
asked you if that helped, and you said
yes. And I knew that we were in

(19:34):
such a loud environment.
And I was I became hyperaware
that during the conversation at the table, it
was really because I was sitting right next
to you. Yeah. It was important for me
to turn my body so you could watch
my mouth.
And
it's funny because I do think that
people would maybe be put out some people
might be put out by that.

(19:56):
Like, you have to adjust to me instead
of the other way around.
And I'm saying it,
it's not hard to make a simple adjustment
to make sure everybody
at the table are experiencing
the same thing as best as everyone can.
My greatest frustration with the human race

(20:17):
is that
people,
we feel put out
by just a little bit of effort to
make sure everybody feels okay. Like, that's somehow
dirty word now.
It's become a dirty word to
be aware, and woke is the colloquialism,
but to be aware

(20:38):
of other human beings around us.
Yeah.
That's a long pontificate
into
No. That's My frustration
of the I get excited when I see,
I I mean, I'm not hard of hearing.
I'm not I don't have any issues around
auditory. Obviously, I have a vocal cord thing

(20:58):
that I was born with. But
when I see movies like CODA
or when I see Marlee Matlin
winning an Oscar,
I'm like,
fuck. Yeah.
It makes the world
smaller,
and it's it's so important for people to
see themselves,

(21:19):
for people to see someone who's a little
different. Mhmm. All of that is so imperative.
It makes me so angry
that that has become vilified.
Can things be taken like, can you get
extra?
Like, if I had come up to you
and been like, oh, let me hold you
like a bebe.
No.
That wouldn't be appropriate. No.

(21:40):
No. Not
what we're talking about.
Right.
Yeah. I mean, I I so appreciate you
saying all that. I mean, I
and for being aware of
how
you could help me understand you in that
loud environment.
Something that I was taught, and this is
exactly related to this, something that I was

(22:03):
it was a mind shift for me.
When I
when I was casting my film, it was
a nonnegotiable
for me for deaf and and hard of
hearing characters
that they be played by actors who are
deaf and and hard of hearing. That was
never in question.
But because I didn't have much experience with
the capital e deaf community, and

(22:25):
I was fortunate enough to be able to
cast Sandra Mae Frank,
amazing deaf actress, by the way, and such
a sweetheart, like, one of the kindest
people. I hired her
her interpreter
for our Zoom conversations.
And her interpreter, before I ever met with
Sandra Mae Frank, said the reason that I'm

(22:47):
hiring her is because
I she's my accommodation. I don't speak ASL,
so I need the interpreter,
not her.
And that was
and I totally agree, but I had never
thought about it like that before.
So what we're getting at is
if if somebody wants to communicate with me

(23:11):
and they would like a, you know, a
response,
then
sometimes I just need a little bit
of assistance in some cases. Sometimes I have
to read lips.
And like you said, it makes it difficult
if someone is talking a different direction and
and I can't read their lips. I will
try

(23:32):
to adapt. I mean, because that's what I've
done my whole life is adapt, but I
can't I can't always participate. So,
you know, I think the
I
understand there's this sort of, like, human tendency
of,
not another thing I have to do for
somebody else. Right? There's there's that life is
hard as it is for every person,

(23:54):
but
we can't live life alone. We need each
other.
And sometimes
some of us
need,
a little bit of accommodation
to participate if you want us to participate.
And that's the way that I I look
at it. And,

(24:14):
you know, because I've had to adapt my
whole life, I don't get offended if someone
doesn't,
accommodate
or doesn't realize that that I need that
accommodation. And sometimes I'll just say, can you
please repeat that? I didn't catch it. So
sometimes I'll advocate for myself.
Yeah. I think what what you said is
is
not only completely right, but completely empathetic,

(24:36):
and and I appreciate that.
Of course.
Absolutely. I mean, it seems like a no
brainer, but
I I remember watching The West Wing,
one of the greatest shows ever made.
And I remember the first time the character,
Joey, who is deaf
and has has a interpreter.

(24:57):
And
when the character,
Josh
was talking with Joey,
and she said, look at me, because he
kept looking at the interpreter.
Mhmm. And she said, look at me. And
that was such an interesting
you know, I'd never thought about it until
that moment.
Like, of course, because we're prone to follow

(25:17):
the sound.
Yep. But they are interpreting
It's no different. As we said in the
beginning,
if you went to the United Nations and
you were talking with someone from
Zimbabwe
and they were speaking their native tongue, you
wouldn't be looking at the interpreter the whole
time. You'd be looking at the dignitary.
Right.

(25:38):
Exactly.
Exactly. It was such an interesting moment. And,
again, I speak to the this is why
things like having this stuff in television and
movies is so important. Absolutely.
In that example that you gave,
the communication is not happening between
the person who hears and the interpreter.

(25:58):
The communication is happening between
the deaf person and the hearing person
that's having the conversation. So, you know, again,
it goes back to communication. Interpreters,
hearing aids, lip reading,
all of the closed captions, all of those
things are
tools,
but the communication
happens

(26:18):
between people. Yeah. And
when
you know, the reason that you would look
at somebody else is a sign of
I'm communicating with you, a sign of respect,
a sign of connection. Right?
So, yeah, what what you said is right
on. I haven't seen enough of West Wing
to have seen that character, so that's that's
great to know that the character Joey, I

(26:39):
think you said, is
is in there. They are exactly right, and
I'm glad that
that was
such a positive and
mind shifting experience for viewers
just like you.
Yeah. It was great. Are those Emmys behind
you, by the way? No.
No. That those are communicator and telly awards

(27:01):
for commercial that I did. So Cool. Telly's
awesome.
Yeah. So I'm I'm proud, but, you know,
this is my work environment.
You teach at Baylor. Correct? I work at
Baylor. I don't teach.
I I am
the associate director of digital strategy for the
business school. I got my film degree here,

(27:24):
because we needed a video production department and
because making films was always a dream for
me. It was it was both, you know.
And so
we
I directed and
co co wrote a commercial that we shot
for the business school, a couple years ago,
and and that's what that's about.
Sweet.

(27:44):
Look at you. You can ask. Yeah. Let's
get into the film that you that that
was at Waco, Healing Hands. Yeah. Talk you
said that it was inspired from childhood, but
talk a little bit about the process, what
the film is about. Yeah. It's it's called
Healing Hands,
as you said.
It's really
it's it's
inspired by my childhood, but it's not it's

(28:07):
a completely literal story. There are definitely,
like, the faith healing scene, which spoiler alert
for those who wanna see it and haven't
seen it. The faith healing scene is
as close as I can remember it being
like with a fictional set of characters, but
pretty much the almost the exact same scenario
with the exception of the mustard seed, which

(28:29):
is physical in the movie but conceptual when
I was a child. It's a six year
old boy named Jonah who
is struggling at school,
is bullied at school.
His parents take him to a faith healer,
and, he, like I did, lied and said
that
he's healed, he's caught in the lie, and
it's sort of a

(28:51):
an eye opening experience for the parents.
And then the end
of the film, which is when Sandra Mae
Frank's character,
comes in, the end of the film, the
teacher's sister
is deaf and the the teacher knows ASL
fluently. And
because of witnessing bullying of Jonah
in her classroom,

(29:12):
she brings in her sister to
teach the kids about ASL and about what
it means to be deaf. And
Jonah finds a new form of healing, and
it's in it's in the hands of
everybody who can speak ASL.
So that's that's what the story is about.
Making it, like I said, was

(29:32):
I it the biggest surprise for me and
the biggest
reason why I I don't I'm not one
of those people that honestly, I really don't
care about awards. I know they're sitting out
here, but it's for
the work appearance or whatever. I I don't
I really don't care about the
awards. I'm not out to be a, like,
a world famous film director. Be cool, but

(29:54):
that's not
what I think I'm here for.
I
am honestly
more excited
by people
who've seen the
film coming up to me
and telling me their story
and or telling me this film would be
great for someone that I love or someone

(30:14):
that I know who
is in the same kind of situation,
it would mean something to them too. And
because of that, it means something to
me as a viewer.
I I am more touched by
that experience
and also the experience of
the production process, the people who came together

(30:35):
and made the film with me, who came
alongside this really difficult project,
but
were
they they were they've resonated with the story.
Even people who had no experience with deaf
or hard of hearing people, they resonated with
the story so much that
they were excited about making this film. I

(30:55):
I did not expect that. I expected them
to treat it just like any other job,
but they really didn't. And that
and and I had made some other films
before that, so the difference was palpable for
me. So I was honestly healed by that
process.
You know? It like, as I said earlier,
it doesn't feel
like a burden
to carry that story anymore

(31:18):
because
now it's a story that can be shared
with many others.
And it could do some good,
and it has done some good, and and
that means
the world to me. And
my ultimate goal is,
eventually, after it stops,
having its festival run, maybe premieres online, is

(31:39):
being able to share it with parents
of of deaf and hard of hearing children
who are hearing themselves as parents
because that's the situation that my parents were
in. That's the situation I was in.
And there's not there historically has not been
a lot of support.
But
within the last decade,

(32:00):
there has been
communities that have sprung up
for parents to support each other
and bring their kids together. And
it brought tears to my eyes when I
saw saw those groups because that's something I
wish I had had as a kid.
So,
yeah, I hope this dome can can be
shared with people like them.
I hope so too. But I also hope

(32:22):
it it's seen by people who are in
the hearing community as well. I agree. The
same reasons we've been talking about this whole
time, you know. Did you call him Jonah
because of the feeling? Yeah. It's Jonah and
the whale. Yeah. Feeling like I was
in the belly of the beast. And and,
honestly, I structured the story in that way
too. So it starts in the classroom,

(32:45):
goes inside the home,
goes in the faith healing scene, which is
the center
of the story.
Yeah. The belly, if you will, and then
he comes back out the other side in
reverse
order. Yeah.
I love that.
I'm a big fan of those sorts of
things.
It it kinda fell in my lap, you
know, once I named him Jonah. I actually

(33:06):
named him Jonah
because there's a there's a movie
called And Your Name is Jonah from the
seventies. It's a television movie. And it's about
a boy who is deaf and his parents
kind of
bring him home from an institution,
that they had put him in. Trying to
reintegrate him
into

(33:26):
the community
was a struggle for all of them, for
both the boy and the parents.
And I that movie touched me. The character
touched me. So I I named him Jonah
first
after that character,
and then I
it I it clicked with me because as
a child, I learned about Jonah and the
whale and, you know, I thought of structuring

(33:48):
the story in that way as a result
of naming the character after that other character.
So it was it was a kind of
a serendipitous thing.
What was your parents' reaction
when they watched the movie, and then what
conversation was facilitated
from that?

(34:08):
Yeah. So they they supported me the whole
way,
and I I knew it was gonna be
difficult for them. They they have a lot
of shame about it,
a lot of guilt about it, and I
I wish
I understand why, but I as a parent
now, I understand why. But I wish also
that
as their child,
they they can let that go. I've told

(34:28):
them many times that and and I told
them this after, you know, they were in
tears hugging me after watching the movie for
the first time,
just kind of sobbing in my arms. And
I've told them many times,
you were doing
what you
you were doing anything. You were grasping at
straws. You were trying to help because you
knew what

(34:49):
awaited me in the world, because you knew
the stigma.
And I don't have to tell them that
it wasn't
the right choice. They know that now. You
know, they felt that after that experience.
But
their choice came from a place of love,
not
a place of
shame about me,
but a place of fear about

(35:09):
what the world could do to me
growing up.
So there's you know,
that's where
listening in this world
is so important.
Because on the surface, you could look at
someone's actions like that, you know, taking their
child to a faith healer and
see, oh, that's messed up. You know? Why

(35:31):
why would you do that to your child?
And and I can understand and appreciate that
perspective.
But in my parents' case,
the intent
was not one of
shame about me, but
of fear about the world.
And
that that's where listening to their story,

(35:52):
listening
to others becomes
critical in in
getting getting through this world alive
and and happy.
Yeah. Tricky. That, isn't it? It is. It
is.
It's very tricky.
When you
found out you were having you were having
your first child
Mhmm. Did you have thoughts around deafness

(36:15):
in regards to your child? Did that
where where did that put you in a
headspace?
So for me,
my
wife was
a little more concerned about that because she
was she didn't grow up in that environment.
She accepts me for who I am and,
would accept our child if she happened to
be deaf as well. I was not concerned

(36:38):
one way or the other because
I knew that
if my child turned out to be deaf,
I would love them. If if they weren't,
I would love them. But also,
if they did happen to be deaf,
if I had had a parent who wore
hearing aids,
I wouldn't have maybe perceived the stigma,

(37:01):
and I would have had somebody who could
relate.
I would have had somebody who could
teach me some things sooner, you know, to
to get by and maybe
and I maybe we could learn ASL together
at the same time. I could be the
child
as a parent
almost like a child with them learning ASL.

(37:21):
So there
there was not really any fear on my
part.
Excitingly, we're expecting
in February.
Hi. So we'll see what happens.
The grass. Boy, a boy this time, and
so yay. And
so I I don't have any fear about
it. But what's amazing is the brazenness of
some people coming up to us the first

(37:43):
time she was pregnant saying, aren't you
worried
about if your child's going to turn out
deaf too? You know, they're
I I get where they're coming from. They're
coming from a place of probably the same
place my parents were in, that fear of,
you know, you want what's best for your
child.
But I don't think they've they've realized how

(38:05):
that sounds.
Yeah. You know? It it it sounds like
you you think there's something
unhappy about the way that I live.
Sure.
I am just as unhappy or happy as
the rest of you. You know? I
am not hung up about
being deaf. I don't even think about it
most of the time unless I'm made aware

(38:27):
of not
understanding what somebody says or being in a
noisy environment.
That's about it. The good news is
regardless of whether your children are hearing or
not hearing,
you still can do that thing of learning
ASL with them. Exactly. You don't have to
wait Exactly. If they're I don't have to
wait. I don't have to wait. The the

(38:48):
urgency would be there, you know, to to
learn it and making time for it would
be critical with the child that,
is deaf. Because, I mean,
if I had been taught the opportunity to
learn both
from day one, I could have been a
part of a bigger world.
You know? I could have been part of

(39:09):
the hearing world and
the capital d deaf community.
From my perspective,
a child's life
a a child's life and world only grows
bigger when they can learn
their primary language and ASL is their primary
language or English is their primary language and
the other is secondary.
It's it's something that I've thought about in

(39:31):
the past, and
if hearing parents have
if they have questions about that, that's that's
what I would say. You know? It's each
or both
Yeah. If you can.
I mean, I'm a big fan of
teaching kids several languages
because, again, makes the world smaller. It's really

(39:51):
good for the brain.
Yeah. It's better at math and music, and
all of it is connected.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Jordan, you're awesome. I'm so glad that So
are you, Susan. That I sat next to
you at the at the
ceremony. Thank you. Me too. And and and
thank you

(40:12):
also
for the kindness of helping me understand what
was being said
at the table because it was a quite
a quite a noisy award ceremony. I could
not
hear half half of what was being said.
Yeah. Well, me neither.
And I have I have my hearing. It
was very loud in there. Yeah. Yeah.

(40:32):
Loud in there.
Tell people how they may find you out
in the world. And
do you have a time frame for
the movie
going to the outside world? As you and
I both know, films have to go to
the festivals
first.
Yes. I'd be coming to someone's town, so
always keep an eye out on film festivals.
But how might people find you and your

(40:53):
work and all that?
I have a
Facebook page,
called,
for healing hands, so you can search for
it there. If you see
a a little boy on the cover with
hearing aids that in a classroom setting, that's
still from the film, so you're probably on
the right page. You can also email me.

(41:14):
It's just firstandlastname@atGmail
or I'm on LinkedIn.
I'm really not big into social media personally.
Like, I'm just not active on it, but,
people can could reach out to me those
ways, and I'm happy to share
anything they wanna know. But as far as
staying in touch with the film and and

(41:35):
how that's going, that Facebook page will
probably be the place to to go. Yeah.
And I'll put links on Hey Human podcast
links page to get there easy so you
don't have to go digging around Facebook, which
is its own
world.
Yes. Its own world.
Well, then thank you so much. This has

(41:57):
been great. Thank you. It's been an honor,
and please stay in touch. It's it's lovely
to know you, Susan, and thank you for
what you do.
Oh, well, thank you. And absolutely. And I
loved Waco. So
Oh,
come back. Please do. What a great town.
The food was great. The people were great.
It was fun walking around. It had all
that history and Yeah. A cool town.

(42:19):
Absolutely. A shout out to Waco is always
appreciated because if you're just driving past Waco
on on the interstate, it doesn't look like
much. You really have to get off the
interstate to experience what wake Waco really is.
It's it's a lovely town.
Lots of, antique stores. I I had a
ball. I walked around a lot by myself,

(42:39):
and I had a really good time. And
the food,
every place I ate was awesome.
Yeah. Waco is big into restaurants.
We have a lot of them, and they're
often very good.
Right. Jordan, thank you, and thank you for
listening, everybody.
Bye. Bye.

(43:00):
Rate, review, and subscribe to Hey Human podcast
on iTunes
or wherever you get your podcast. Thanks.
Bye.