Last night during The Women Tell All episode of The Bachelor, fan favorite Abigail Heringer talked about repesenting the hearing loss community, what it was like being the first deaf contestant, and how being deaf differs from being Deaf (with a capital D). I was really scared when I decided to come on just because I think people view the hearing community and then the Deaf community with a capital D as black and white, Heringer said. And I m kind of that gray space in the middle that hasn t had a lot of light shown on.
She went on to explain that while she was born profoundly deaf and can t hear without her cochlear implant, she hasn t been accepted as part of the Deaf community because she communicates vocally rather than with sign language.