Def and living with Tourette

Meet Shawn Jackson. I met him on a social networking site and we became fast friends. My hubby and I even had the pleasure to have him accompany us to a business meeting, in which he kindly gave us a copy of his magazine J'Adore!! He is an inspiring, down to earth, humble young man that has learned to play the hand life has dealt him. Even if that hand was a "fold". Check out his magazine and a poem he wrote about being def and having tourette!

WELL SAID MY FRIEND!!

Several parts of me Alone. Many of you know I have Tourette and I'm Deaf. But I never told anyone really how I felt. This is it.



I scream, I hiss, I flail, I miss

I hurt, I maim, and I feel this

A hurt, a twitch, an internal dis

A loss of control, a nuclear near miss

I can't help it, Can't stop it

Can't undo it, can't block it

I can't restrain or refrain it

Can't train my body to contain it

Its built up, can't shut up,

like a faucet that's dripped up

Movements and vocals stay popped up

And through it all, I stand up

Can't stop me, can't contain me

I won't allow it to define me

It doesn't explain the real me

I'm quite sane, here is no insanity

You see the Tourette and think it's me

But is that all there is of me that you see?

Is my yelling indicative of my capacity?

Or is that all you can judge as my quality?



Silence, stillness, yet a static noise

The quiet, the irritation, yet a fake poise

Bearing derision, isolation, yet still making noise

Aloneness, tears welling, yet joking w/ the boys

The hunger for hearing, for understanding, and learning

Yet none stepped forward to hear my yearning

None wanted to learn a new way of communicating

with me, and so I was left wanting and hurting

Alone, quite bare and cold, left needing an ear, a hand

another soul who could understand, with hands,

my words. And the last sounds i heard was in some distant stands

on TV in a crowd gone wild. And here, I thought, alone I stand

Depression took me hard like a terrible earthquake

And to it, there is nothing I can quite equate

to the sadness that enveloped me whole, made my soul deflate

Nothing prepared me for a world of Deafness, a totally new state

I had to move away to find my world, a new world of silent words

it was "Fire" and "water" said with hands, pictures became words

It was first place in my mind, no where near a distant third

Being able to talk without uttering a single word

Months became years, and years piled on and on

yet my wanting, while on hold, had finally won

The road to finally getting my CI was one that was hardspun

on an axis delicately balanced, as if I carried a ton

And now that I can hear, it's not totally a clean sheet

Still with the triumphs and hardships settling beneath

I still struggle, day and out, without using a cheatsheet

Reading lips, saying "pardon?" and "Repeat please?"



My life is my own, and its not been easy

Still not, but life isn't for the queasy.