Hi! My name is Farah and I am the CEO and Co-founder of Deaf-i. I want to introduce myself and explain the purpose of Deaf-i. I am a 17-year-old Deaf bilateral cochlear implant recipient. I was diagnosed through a newborn hearing screen. At about 6 months of age, I was fitted with bilateral hearing aids. I was a successful hearing aid user but eventually, my hearing began to change. When I was four years old, I underwent my first cochlear implant surgery. I remained hearing-aided on my right side with a CI on my left for the next few years of my hearing journey. Although I was a successful bimodal user eventually my hearing in my aided ear began to decline, which led to my second surgery at 8, almost 9 years old. Being born into a hearing family, spoken language became my main form of communication, and I participated in the Birth to Three program along with extensive auditory verbal therapy throughout my early life.
Deaf-i was born out of the need to build a community for CI recipients, inspired by both the Deaf and hearing world. There's a lot of us out there but we are all disconnected because we are straddling two different worlds. We are part of both the deaf and hearing community and that can be isolating, so I want Deaf-i to be an opportunity for us to unite and to be a safe space to share our stories, successes, and failures so that we can become a support system for one another and lean on each other. It is my belief that we can benefit from shared experiences, our support systems, friendships, professional resources, and familial experiences. These resources can help the next generation of recipients to break down barriers and maximize individual potential. I grew up with a great support system. I have my siblings, my parents, ENT, speech pathologist, and an audiologist. All these people helped me during my hearing journey to the point that it is considered a success. Without them, I wouldn't be the person I am today. However, I do wish that my younger self had a role model—someone to talk to and look up to, someone who could answer all the questions that the people around me couldn't. That's what I want Deaf-i to be: a support system. I hope that for individuals and families, regardless of whether you are starting along the spoken language path, we can fast forward for you and provide a glimpse of what the future may look like, especially during times when the view is often blurred. Thank you for taking the time to get to know me and Welcome to Deaf-i I am so grateful to walk along the path together!