Ahead of the curve
Oklahomans celebrate increased access to services for deaf-blind individuals.
As the crowd awaited the Oklahoma governor’s arrival at the state Capitol on June 27, a woman described the room in great detail to the woman next to her.
“The walls are a beautiful baby blue, with wonderful white trim,” the woman said.
Like many others in the crowd, the woman describing the room was a Support Service Provider, an individual who is trained to be the eyes and ears for individuals with combined hearing and visual loss.
When Gov. Mary Fallin entered the room, the crowd rose to greet her and listened as she read a proclamation recognizing the celebration and the accomplishments of deaf-blind Oklahomans.
This proclamation came shortly after a House bill was passed in late April, increasing deaf-blind Oklahomans’ access to Support Service Providers by providing grants for the program through the Department of Rehabilitation Services.
“Deaf blindness is one of the most severe of all disabilities,” Fallin said. “Deaf-blind Oklahomans have been empowered by the passage of House Bill 1244. It will help provide funding to increase staff for the deaf-blind community.”
House Bill 1244, also known as the “Jeri Cooper Act,” is a huge stride forward for Oklahoma, said Molly Sinanan, Helen Keller National Center regional representative.
“Oklahoma has developed a
community where people understand and they’re growing and they’re improving, and Oklahoma is really, in some ways, ahead of the curve compared to some states,” Sinanan said. “A lot of states don’t have SSP services.”
Jeri Cooper, a Department of Rehabilitation Services rehabilitation teacher who is deaf-blind herself, was a major advocate for creating a Support Service Provider program in Oklahoma when she started working at the department nine years ago.
It was through chance that she met an Oklahoma state representative who was inspired by her story and began working to help her increase the services available, she said.
Cooper teared up as she recalled the day she discovered what the representative had done for her, attributing her passion for her work to her mother.
“When I came to his office on Disability Awareness Day, that’s when I found out that he’d named it ‘Jeri Cooper,’ so I was really touched by that because I thought ‘Mama did it,' ” Cooper said. “It’s like God has given me the opportunity to give back to other deafblind people, and it’s like every time I see a success story it’s like ‘Yay mama.’ She was the epitome of what SSPs are.”
The camaraderie Cooper,
her vocational rehabilitation counselor, Stephanie Butler, and others involved in the deafblind community share is evident when one sees them all in a room together.
'A huge deal'
Sinanan said the thing that brings the community together is the communication taught and pushed through Support Service Provider and Helen Keller National Center programs.
“There’s this huge variance of hearing and vision loss, but the thing and the reason it impacts everyone who is deaf-blind is the gap in communication,” Sinanan said. “That’s what separates people who have combined vision and hearing loss from the community
and from other people.”
They all have different ways of communicating; two people walk up to each other and use tactile signs within each others' hands, while another across the room is talking into the one working ear of another. But they are all smiling and laughing.
“If we can't communicate, then we’re just sitting being isolated,” Cooper said. “You talk about just Stephanie drawing a smile on my back, when you smile, it totally pulled me into the conversation, people don’t know how isolated it can be when you don’t have that.”
Like many others, Butler and Cooper took Donald Gore in when he lost his vision and hearing to
Usher Syndrome.
Gore said he was devastated when his disabilities began to prevent him from working, so Cooper and Butler sent him to the Helen Keller National Center, where he learned ways to cope with deafblindness, like how to cook blindfolded and how to read braille.
“Once I got there, I learned so much up there, it was just amazing what I learned,” Gore said. “It’s amazing that I met a lot of friends up there. They’re just a second home to me.”
Now Gore has received job offers, is able to complete day-to-day activities and easily communicate with his friends and family; all things he says he owes to Cooper and Butler for getting him help.
“This is a big turnaround for me, and I’m so happy that they got me into it, and I won’t forget them as long as I’m here,” Gore said.
Although there is more to be done, the “Jeri Cooper Act” will make more success stories like Gore’s possible, Butler said, and she hopes the bill will bring more awareness to a close community of people who long to be understood.
“I think it’s overcoming another barrier. We have much further to go, but this recognition is a huge deal, especially for deaf-blind because a lot of people in the community and in everyday life, this is not their world — they’re completely oblivious to this whole population that is isolated,” Butler said.