Hearing-impaired Nigerians have resorted to marrying themselves following the stigma and discrimination they face from the hearing population. This is amid fears nursed by their families that they could end up having children with profound hearing loss. In this enthralling report by ANGELA ONWUZOO, some deaf couples shared their experiences and frustration in the search for love and lifelong desire to start a family.
52-year-old, Saheed Ajakore, the firstborn in a family of three, is hearing impaired.
The Ogun State indigene and shoe cobbler is not the only one in the family that is deaf, as one of his younger sisters and last in the family, Aina, was also born with profound hearing loss.
However, his other sister, Mrs. Yemisi Abere, was lucky, as she was born without the impairment.
Our correspondent learnt that Saheed and Aina, are usually withdrawn from people due to communication challenges.
Their efforts to get life partners within the hearing community have always been frustrated by communication barriers, leaving them with no choice but to settle with their kind.
While Saheed is unhappy with his second marriage to Sade, a hearing-impaired woman, his sister, Aina, is presently a single mother with two children.
She was impregnated by two different men from the deaf community, who later abandoned her and remarried.
Discrimination
Communicating with the hearing-impaired siblings was a difficult one and had to be done through their sister, Abere, who became a sign language interpreter out of necessity.
She told our correspondent that for her siblings, going into marriage had always been a risky venture, as they always suffer rejection and discrimination, even among their kind.
“But the discrimination comes more from those within the hearing community,” she lamented.
The light-complexioned woman, who is a civil servant, said her siblings were at various times rejected or abandoned in the middle of relationships they went into, adding that this compounded the pain of dejection they felt.
Eager to share his frustration with PUNCH Healthwise, especially how he has been in pursuit of love and happiness, within which time he always got his heart shattered, Saheed said life had been unfair to him.
In his one-room apartment at No. 13, Ogo Oluwa Street, Bariga, Lagos, which also doubles as the manufacturing place for his shoes, our correspondent observed that his finished products were bought mainly by people in the hearing community, but yet, he was not considered worthy of love and being loved by them.
The cobbler, our correspondent noticed, communicates with his customers through sign language and illustrations made inside a big notebook.
He recounted, “I have always wanted to be happy and not allow my condition to deny me any good thing in life. Getting a woman that will love, cherish and give me children has been tough.
“But I am determined to have my own family and so, I looked for a woman of my kind to marry. That was how I met Yinka, a sister to one of my customers.
“After 14 months of courtship, we got married and I was looking forward to a bright future with her. Our families were in support of the marriage, but little did I know that Yinka was only after my money and never loved me. She later left me.”
Hearing impaired and emotions
Experts say the deaf also have emotional challenges among their kind and that most times, they have shallow knowledge about marriage and childrearing.
A Professor of Hearing, Speech-Language Education/Rehabilitation, Department of Education, University of Ibadan, Julius Ademokoya, told PUNCH Healthwise in an exclusive interview that deaf people are usually more aggressive than the hearing population.
The professor, who is President of the Speech Pathologists and Audiologists Association in Nigeria, said, “Ordinarily, deaf people love to marry from those that have no hearing impairment but then, they face the challenge of not being able to find those who are interested and ready to love them the way they are. They don’t have any choice but to look for their kind to marry.”
False pregnancy
With a pained expression, the cobbler recalled his ordeal with Yinka, noting that six months after they got married, she told him about being pregnant for him.
“I was very excited about the prospect of becoming a father,” he told our correspondent through his interpreter.
But the pregnancy turned out to be a hoax, as Saheed later discovered that it was all a ploy to fleece him and run away.
He said, “I didn’t know that she never loved me and never wanted to be with me from the beginning. She used the false pregnancy to siphon my money, claiming she was attending antenatal care.
“It was a nurse in the hospital where she claimed to have registered for antenatal that told me and my sisters about her game plan. The woman said she wasn’t happy with the way Yinka was extorting me. That was how the marriage ended.
“The trauma was much for me, but with support from family members, I was able to pull through and move on with my life”
Hearing impairment, a devastating disability
According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, profound congenital deafness is one of the most devastating disabilities that afflict man.
“Not only is the deaf person isolated from his fellow man by an invisible, nearly insurmountable barrier of silence, but he is frequently thought to be mentally retarded and treated as such.
“He does not respond to verbal communication, and his attempts at speech are painfully awkward. Speech, being an imitative function, is almost impossible to learn for the profound, congenitally deaf person”, it stated.
Giving love another chance
In 2018, Saheed decided to give love and marriage another shot and got married to Sade, who also has profound hearing loss.
Sade, who PUNCH Healthwise learnt became deaf in her childhood, is a petty trader and displays her wares in front of her husband’s shop cum apartment.
For over five years now that they have been living together, the couple, our correspondent gathered from neighbours has been a reference point in the area, with many wondering how they can cohabit happily.
However, further interaction with the couple showed that all was not well with the union.
The sad looks on their faces and the anger exhibited when they speak to each other raised concerns.
Denied sex
Poised to get to the root of the hostility being subtly displayed by the couple towards each other, our correspondent, in a voice filled with concern asked Saheed why he was unhappy with his wife.
“Sade is threatening to leave me,” he said in a voice laden with emotion.
“I have been doing everything to make her happy, all to no avail. For over two years now, she has been denying me sex. She doesn’t want to have sex with me anymore. We don’t have a child yet. If we don’t come together, how are we going to have children?
“Both families have spoken to her and she has refused to change. What she does every night is to leave the room and sleep elsewhere, only to return in the morning. I am tired of the rejection. I am sad.”
Responding to Saheed’s allegation, Sade told our correspondent through an interpreter that she was ready to stay with her husband but was not interested in having sex.
When our correspondent asked Sade why she took the decision, she became agitated and started signing angrily.
She said, “I am not interested. I told him that I am not interested. He should leave me alone. I cook for him, wash his clothes and take good care of him. He should stop complaining.”
Repeated rejection
Aina, Saheed’s sister with a hearing impairment, told our correspondent through the interpreter that she was exploited by the two men she was married to.
According to her, “In 2004, one came from Ogun State to marry me. He is also deaf. After I got pregnant, he abandoned me and went to marry another woman. He also abandoned the baby we had together. It was my family that paid the bills when I gave birth.
“A similar episode happened in 2017. That one agreed to marry me and I became pregnant. When I put to birth, we held a naming ceremony.
“He later told me that he was no longer interested in the relationship and that his family wanted him to marry someone without hearing problems to avoid having babies with the condition.
“After several pleas, he still abandoned me and my baby to do his family’s wish. But he ended up marrying a deaf person because the hearing community rejected him.
“My two children are normal and they are with my relatives because I can’t take care of them. I don’t have the means to take care of them because I am jobless”, Aina said.
Aina’s sister, Abere, told PUNCH Healthwise that when their late mother discovered that her siblings had hearing impairment, she took them to different hospitals and prayer houses for healing, but their condition defiled both medical and spiritual solutions.
Not to marry their kind
Speaking on why inter-marriage is sometimes opposed among those in the deaf community, Mr. Adewale Adeyanju, who is also hearing-impaired, said his family initially opposed his decision to marry a beautiful woman with the same condition for fear that they would be burdened with deaf grandchildren.
Adeyanju, who is the Public Relations Officer, Joint National Association of Persons with Disabilities, Lagos chapter, said the problem of rejection comes mainly from the family.
Healthy children
Speaking with PUNCH Health via WhatsApp, he said, “The problem usually comes from relatives and family members of the woman in question.
“They always fear for their future and have this mindset that a deaf man cannot provide for his family or that they would have children that are deaf.
“Some deaf ladies are so beautiful. Unfortunately, when those without hearing impairment marry them, they exploit their deafness. This explains why many of them feel secure with the deaf
“Many families oppose having their deaf children marry their kind, but God’s way is wonderful because sometimes, none of their children is born deaf. I am such. I married a deaf lady and we have children that don’t have the condition.
“Many people think that if a deaf man marries a deaf woman, they will produce deaf children, it’s a fallacy. Some hearing couples have been known to produce four deaf children at a go.”
Adeyanju blamed the misunderstanding among deaf couples on communication gap.
“When they have issues, many don’t know how to sit down and communicate. The problem is they may have been hiding their misunderstanding without telling elders and their pastor”, he added.
Vow to be with the deaf
Mrs. Kudiratu Ighetsemhe, 35, is also hearing impaired and happily married to Peter, who also has profound hearing loss.
Their union, PUNCH Healthwise learnt, is blessed with three kids.
Before she got married to Peter in 2010, a man with no hearing disability asked for her hand in marriage.
Kudiratu, who said she lost the ability to hear at the age of two, after being struck with measles, said she was ready to marry him, but her mother opposed the decision, insisting that she must marry her kind.
“Both men from the deaf and hearing community came to ask for my hand in marriage but my mother didn’t accept the family of the hearing suitor. She said I would be badly treated by them. I am happy to have married Peter. We quarrel and settle it within ourselves. We have three children, two boys, and a girl. They can all hear.
Her mother, Mrs. Omowunmi Nofiru, told PUNCH Healthwise that she insisted that her only child must marry among her kind because she had seen those with hearing impairment being abused.
She said, “I have seen some ladies with hearing impairments that got married to those that can hear being treated like animals. I don’t want anyone to maltreat my daughter. She was born normal. It was after she had measles as a child that she lost her ability to hear.”
Our correspondent gathered that two out of Kudiratu’s three children are being taken care of by her mother, while her husband’s parents are with one.
Her firstborn, Emmanuel, told our correspondent that his siblings usually communicate with their parents through a sign language app on their phones.
Mrs. Fausat Idris, who also has profound hearing impairment, shared a similar experience about being discriminated against when she wanted to get married and urged the Lagos State government to support them.
Over 8.5m Nigerians suffering from hearing impairment
Meanwhile, experts who spoke with our correspondent suggested ways to address the challenges faced by those with hearing impairment.
Prof. Ademokoya said one major behavioural issue with the deaf is that they are more aggressive than those without the condition.
“Aggression is a big challenge among deaf people. It is either because the disability affects them or because of stigma and discrimination they might have suffered.”
“So, the tendency to have anger or aggression exhibited among the deaf is very high.
“Of course, in marriage, a lot of things happen. If you can’t tolerate your spouse, exercise patience and understanding, then there will be friction all the time.
“So, that also tells you why even among themselves, they have misunderstandings and get divorced.
“But that doesn’t mean you don’t have couples who are quite very happy”, he said.
The professor said no fewer than 8.5 million Nigerians are suffering from hearing impairments.
Misunderstanding
Giving insight into why people with hearing impairment marry among themselves, the speech therapist said, “As you have observed, they marry more often among themselves due to two factors.
“First, there is a bond because they see themselves as being of the same kind and realise they have a problem.
“So, they feel more comfortable among themselves. But mind you, that feeling is not that they wouldn’t have loved to marry those that can hear. But they have this mindset that they will not be accepted wholeheartedly. That mistrust is based on the attitude exhibited by those that can hear when relating with them.
Continuing, he said, “Most times, the understanding that deaf people have about marriage is so low. So, family members must always come around to assist them to navigate. They usually need assistance from people around them.
“Also, a lot of them have financial problems. They need money to take care of their children. The financial issue is a major problem in their marriage.”
Treatment options
An Ear, Nose & Throat Consultant at Garki Hospital, Abuja, Dr. Enema Amodu, said that hearing loss in childhood could be treated depending on the cause.
According to him, some of the causes of hearing loss are congenital while some are acquired.
Dr. Amodu who is a past Chairman of, the Nigeria Medical Association, FCT Chapter, said, “The ones we classify as congenital are those that they are born with. The ones they are born with could be due to developmental abnormalities.
He said, “This is when there is an arrest in the progression of development. Either in the development of the skull, nerves for hearing, or that the child has other conditions, which we call syndromic child or children.
“When they are now born with these developmental abnormalities, it can affect their hearing level. So, they will be born without the ability to hear any sound.
“But some other causes can also be acquired, like wax impaction. The cause of hearing loss in children can also be due to infection.”
Early intervention can reduce hearing loss severity
The ENT expert, however, pointed out that early intervention could help reduce the severity and impact of hearing loss.
“The discovery of the hearing loss on time helps to arrest the situation.
Putting the child in a normal school can delay early intervention and puts the child at a disadvantage.
“Parents should accept the reality of their child’s condition and seek early intervention rather than living in denial.
“Identifying it early and trying to properly school the child by putting him or her in a proper facility to learn sign language can help. Start your child in a special school”, he said.
Dr. Amodu stressed that there is nothing wrong with normal people marrying from the deaf community, adding that hearing loss is common and hereditary.
He said hearing loss does not have any link with sexual desires.
On Sade’s attitude, the physician said, “I think rejection is just what is playing out. Maybe she is not convinced the man loves her or she could be in love with another person. Hearing loss does not affect female and male sexual organs.”
More causes of deafness in children
A Senior Lecturer at the Department of Paediatrics, College of Medicine, University of Lagos, Dr. Beatrice Ezenwa, said children with brain abnormalities might be able unable to hear.
The Consultant Neonatologist and Paediatrician with the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, Idi-Araba, said apart from congenital abnormalities that affect the brain, the most common causes of hearing impairment in children are asphyxia (a child that did not cry at birth), measles, jaundice, infection, and meningitis.
“That is why mothers should take their babies for immunization to prevent infections that might lead to hearing loss”, she advised.
On his part, a Lagos-based Speech Therapist, Mr. Sunday Iheakolam,
said the easiest way to communicate with those with hearing impairment is through sign language, which according to him, they must start learning from childhood.
He said, “Most people in Nigeria find it difficult to communicate and interact with the deaf due to the language barrier. Many of them don’t understand sign language. In speech therapy, early intervention is key and people with hearing loss learn better when they start from childhood.”
Counselling for deaf couples
Prof. Ademokoya suggested that deaf couples should go for marriage counselling, adding that it will help to address some of the challenges they face.
He also enjoined them to improve on their self-development, and read books about marriage and psychology.
For Dr. Amodu, people should learn to be a bit more tolerant with those with hearing impairment.
Hearing impairment statistics to rise – WHO
Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation says an estimated 135 million people have hearing impairments in Africa, with the figure likely to rise to over 338 million by 2050.
According to WHO, the burden of ear and hearing problems reflects significant inequalities disproportionately impacting marginalised populations
It noted that over 60 per cent of common ear diseases and hearing loss could be detected and managed at the primary level of care, but that in most places, access to care continues to be limited to highly specialised centres and clinics.
