There are few individuals in this world who are born advocates and educators: Dr. Michelle Hu is one of them. Michelle has an Instagram account with nearly ten thousand followers, where she shares her deaf/hard of hearing (“DHH”) journey as a mother and pediatric audiologist.
The team at InnoCaption wants to highlight Michelle as an impactful member of the deaf and hard of hearing community because she empowers others through sharing her personal experiences. By providing a glimpse of what growing up and working with hearing loss is like, Michelle is changing the lives of her patients every day.
Her influence extends beyond her patients, however. Michelle also seeks to educate parents, mentors, and clinicians around the world through the curated resources on her website and her very own course for parents of children who are DHH. She values the deaf and hard of hearing community like family, which she constantly aims to support and lift up.
So how does Michelle Hu live powerfully as an adult who is DHH? Here’s what she has to say about her work!
“I have a history of progressive hearing loss due to Enlarged Vestibular Aqueduct and Pendred Syndrome,” Michelle says. “During my senior year of college, I had another sudden drop in hearing. This time, I was especially distraught because it hadn't happened for a while and I thought I had my life all planned out.”
While waiting to get an audiological evaluation, Michelle remembers that her mother looked over at her and said she might make a good audiologist: she knew first hand how her patients may feel and what it is like to live powerfully as a person who is DHH.
Michelle confirms, “[My mother] was right — I knew I wanted to help. Being an audiologist, especially a pediatric one, gives me a career in which I can optimize my personal experiences and really make a difference by being able to meet my patients where they are at.”
For Michelle, pediatric audiology allows her to be her authentic self. “It's a superpower to be able to relate to or get into the shoes of my patients or their parents. While I've never known what it’s like to be a parent of a DHH child, I've seen my patients and their parents along their journey. I've seen the effects of their support, their struggles, how we all hold each other up as a family — I'm living proof of the end result.”
Diving deeper into the significance of her patients’ journeys, Michelle explains that “every single person's journey is different, even within the same family. I love being able to relate to my patients and also support their parents by answering any of their questions to help them guide their children.”
In reflecting on the challenges of her career, Michelle comments that “there are absolutely some things I cannot hear or have difficulty doing, like listening to patient amplification devices or speech perception testing.”
However, she has discovered many ways to overcome these obstacles, and she emphasizes that she is powerful and capable despite them. “I know that [these challenges] do not influence what kind of audiologist I am for my patients. Yes, there are some tasks or situations where it may be difficult for me to hear or understand, but that doesn't mean I am not a powerful and capable human or mother.”
Michelle also offers an important perspective on being DHH. “As a DHH adult, I am not broken. I am not inadequate or incomplete. I am simply differently abled. I choose to utilize cochlear implant technology to access auditory sound and communicate verbally. My kids understand this very well.”
She then echoes this point for the larger community. “My fellow DHH peers and community are not broken. We are strong. We are here. We are differently abled. In my journey online, I've been able to offer insight, but I've also undergone transformation myself. Sometimes the person you're helping most is yourself. My heart has overflowed with love, support, insight and change. I used to feel alone — like I was constantly walking uphill — now I know I'm not the only one.”
“I don't see it going away at all,” Michelle affirms. “However, I see it growing towards a more patient-first, inclusive community. I see professionals accepting DHH individuals as powerful, capable, and differently abled. We are not broken. We do not need to be fixed. If we choose to utilize amplification, great. If we do not, wonderful.”
Directed towards the audiologists of the future, Michelle calls, “Meet us where we are at and get into our shoes. Empower and support us with understanding, support, tools and knowledge versus ‘fixing’ us.”
“I started my IG account with the idea that I'd try it for a year,” Michelle recalls. “If I still enjoyed it, I'd take a look at seeing what else I could create that would make a more significant impact for the DHH population. It was a no brainer — thousands of parents were asking me similar questions and for more support.”
Michelle explains that she was guided by the question, How could I provide long-term help to the parents of DHH children? She collected frequently asked questions about the topic, gathered the knowledge and experiences she’d accumulated from thirty-nine years of living powerfully as a DHH child/adult/mother and over twelve years of clinical practice, and poured her heart into this program.
Michelle’s goal was “to provide DHH children with confident and supportive parents and villages so they can group up knowing they are limitless in achieving all of their dreams or making an impact in the world. [The program] is for the children, but I start at the roots — arming their parents, clinicians, mentors, and physicians with resources, know-hows, stories, and access so the children can relate, create, support and guide.”
Michelle mentions that she has had parents reach out to her, relaying that they feel less overwhelmed, can navigate straight to where they want to go, and are more confident in creating and paving their own journeys. She’s also been contacted by AuD and SLP students who have gained so much knowledge and insight!
We hoped you loved learning more about Michelle Hu as much as we enjoyed spotlighting her. Big thank you to Michelle for being the first in this series. Please check out her website and her social media, and stay tuned for the next community spotlight!
InnoCaption provides real-time captioning technology making phone calls easy and accessible for the deaf and hard of hearing community. Offered at no cost to individuals with hearing loss because we are certified by the FCC. InnoCaption is the only mobile app that offers real-time captioning of phone calls through live stenographers and automated speech recognition software. The choice is yours.
InnoCaption proporciona tecnología de subtitulado en tiempo real que hace que las llamadas telefónicas sean fáciles y accesibles para la comunidad de personas sordas y con problemas de audición. Se ofrece sin coste alguno para las personas con pérdida auditiva porque estamos certificados por la FCC. InnoCaption es la única aplicación móvil que ofrece subtitulación en tiempo real de llamadas telefónicas mediante taquígrafos en directo y software de reconocimiento automático del habla. Usted elige.
