Hi all, I am a deaf dancer. I was born with binaural sensorineural hearing loss. My parents did not discover that I was deaf until I had Kindergarten screening. At that time, I had several tests done to find out the nature and strength of my loss.
I was at that time, at a moderate hearing loss and had tubal ligation surgery. After that was unsuccessful, I was fitted for my first pair of hearing aids. They were bulky, made my ears stick out, but BOY! I still remember some of the first sounds I could hear clearly. I have been blessed to have a mother whom is an English teacher. She helped me with my pronunciation and grammar. I also had help through the school with Speech Therapy and a deaf “counselor”. I never learned ASL until I was about 10, but only then it was broken sign. Today, I know a lot more sign language but I still rely on lip reading for half my communication. The other half being my hearing aids.
I started dance classes when I was 5 years old. I started out with Ballet in which my teacher had also introduced us to some other styles of dance. I stayed with Ballet until I was 18 years old. I learned English, Russian, and Italian styles of Ballet. I did tap, jazz, liturgical, colorguard, and self taught Cabaret. I’ve always been fascinated with Bellydancing and self taught through videos for a few years; mainly as a form of exercise. During my dance class hiatus, I had picked up Fire Spinning, in which I am 98% self taught.
When I moved from South Dakota to Wisconsin. I decided that I needed to be back on stage. I missed performing and wanted to improve my fire spinning game somehow. I love doing my fire fans and I met some spinners who are also bellydancers. I put two and two together and started searching for classes!
I found a troupe that is based out of Eau Claire, WI that I absolutely fell in love with. I watched their videos, saw them perform live, and decided that was it. I started classes! As of today, I am in level 2 of ATS(r) and working towards level 3 and prop work. I am doing baskets as my first focus and I am loving every minute of it!
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