People You Should Know | A Deaf Mom Shares Her World

Jill Bianco– A Deaf Gal Who Plays Baseball

Jill Bianco is one tough gal. A baseball going at warp speed doesn’t faze her a bit. Jill is part of a twelve-woman baseball team, the Liberty Belles and the only deaf woman that I know who plays baseball.

Jill played fast-pitch softball for many years in every position except pitcher. She joined the Chicago Gems baseball team after responding to an ad on Craigslist. On February 12, Jill will head to Hong Kong to play in the 2009 Phoenix Cup International Women Baseball Tournament.

As the only deaf woman on the team, communication can be a challenge but Jill faces it with candor:

Being Deaf and playing ball can be tough sometimes. I face many challenges but I haven’t let them get me down, or stop me from playing the sport I truly love. I can do everything other ball players can do, both on the field and off, the only difference is that I do not hear. Baseball doesn’t require a lot of verbal communication on the field. With all the visual signs being used there isn’t much need for verbal communication. This puts every teammate on the same page, with equal access and knowledge of what to do next. I strive to show the world that a Deaf female ball player can be as good as anyone. I’d like to educate people so they understand that Deaf people aren’t what they’re stereotyped as.

As you can imagine, it isn’t cheap to head to Hong Kong and Jill isn’t going to let limited funds stop her. If you have a few dollars (or more) to spare, you can help with Jill’s dream to play baseball:

Jill Bianco’s Baseball Opportunity

Update:

Hi everyone! I m Jill. I just got back from Hong Kong yesterday. I had a blast. We, North American Liberty Belles, won silver medal for the tournament. We lost to Japan in the Championship. I m also proud to share that I have received a huge honor of being selected as a Team Most Valuable Player (MVP) for the Liberty Belles!

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Jill Wood, Parent Extraordinaire

Yesterday, I finally had my first mammogram. A mammogram that I had been putting off for over a year.

“Have you had your mammogram?” Jill Wood, a parent of a hard of hearing son, asked me during an IM conversation a year ago. Jill had just been diagnosed with breast cancer and was about to begin chemotherapy.

“I haven’t had one yet, but I will,” I typed back. The doctor had given me the RX for a mammogram earlier that year, but I couldn’t find the paper. I just put the procedure on the back burner.

When I received the RX again this year, I told myself that I really needed to follow through with it. So there I was yesterday, dressed in a gown and about to haul my boobs over a plastic plate to be squished.

“Just a minute,” the technician said. “I need to get the larger plate.” She replaced the regular-sized plastic plate with the larger plate.

I rolled my eyes and quickly, my thoughts went to Jill.

I gotta tell her about this, I said to myself. She would crack up at the thought of hauling out a larger plate for my anatomy.

My thoughts soon turned dark as I noticed a spot on one of the digital images that came up on the screen.

“Should I be worried?” I asked the technician.

“No, you have to wait for the doctor to review the images and they’ll call you within a week.”

I was driving home yesterday and thinking, “I gotta call Jill and talk to her.”

That night, I received a message from Barbara, another parent who knew Jill:

Hi Karen - I know you don’t read Listen-up every day but thought you would want to know that Jill Wood passed away on Friday, Dec. 26. I knew she’d taken a turn for the worse a couple of months ago but didn’t realize the extent. I’m very, very sad.

I sat there stunned. And I cried. I called Barbara for the first time and we talked. I emailed Helen, Jill’s friend and learned that Jill was doing well five days before and then took a rapid turn for the worse. The world lost a great woman, a great mom. I know I’m not alone in feeling this way because on the parent listserv where we met, many other parents felt the same way. You see, Jill was an incredible mom who greeted parent after parent on the list, sharing her thoughts, her feelings and all the things she learned throughout the years of parenting a son with progressive hearing loss. Her son sent my oldest son some Weird Al music and got him hooked on Weird Al videos as a result. So I bought a Weird Al video for Christmas last year for my oldest son and the kids just cracked up watching it.

Jill wrote with wit and wisdom and her personality shone through with every post she shared. I’m not kidding. Ask any parent on the listserv and you’ll see that this gal stood out and many learned from her.

Jill was a freelance illustrator who drew book covers. She shared some of her designs with me and I was blown away by her talent. Last October, when she first began chemotherapy, she and I wrote back and forth. She joked about doing reconstructive surgery and getting a set of perky boobs that would be the envy of everyone in the nursing home when she turned 90.

Yes, that was Jill, ever the optimist with a wisecrack. In one of her emails, she said she was off to get her “poison cocktails” and said that she was going to make her doctors insert a fancy drink umbrella on it. “At least I’ll get to catch up on some much needed sleep,” she joked about the side effects. I was about to leave for a cruise at that time, so I emailed back and said that I would have a Pina Colada in her honor, complete with an umbrella and send her a picture.

“Here’s the picture, as promised,” I wrote to her when we arrived back. I was in a swimsuit, holding a pina colada with an umbrella perched in it. ”I wouldn’t send just anyone a picture of me in a swimsuit,” I joked. “Only for you, girl.”

So as I wait for result from the mammogram, I’m going to celebrate Jill’s life and dig out the Weird Al video for our trip up to Michigan. Here’s to you, Jill.

Jill and her husband Larry, in their funny slippers

Jill’s Caring Bridge Journal

Donations in Jill’s name can be made to:

Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

MD Anderson Cancer Center for IBC Research

Update:

After two mammograms and an ultrasound, the doc sent me home saying that all is fine.

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Uncovering Written Memories

I was going through a pile of papers and the hand-written essay caught my eye. It was an essay written during my freshmen year at a local community college. I sat down to read it and was instantly transported back in time. I received an “A” on this essay, probably not so much for how it was written (because I see many mistakes and ways it could be written differently) but more for the story it shared:

Even now, seven years later, I can still remember the first time I met Mike. I was eleven years old when we drove up to our newly bought cottage. As we settled down, a slightly balding man walked over and introduced himself as Mike. That was the beginning of a special friendship that was rather slow in forming [at first].

I cannot remember much of the first four years. I was a very shy girl then, but Mike’s friendliness won me me over. I was like a turtle, coming out of my shell when Mike was around.

The shell really broke when I began to show a serious interest in [water]skiing. Mike’s son used to waterski competitevely and Mike used his knowledge to encourage me. He gave me the encouragement that I wanted so much from my own parents.

He taught me a card game called “Casino” and we spent many a time together winning and losing to each other. He was dubbed “The Champ,” and whenever I would win a game, I would [strut around and] call myself, “The Champ.” But never for long, because he would win back the title in the next game.

Mike had a great sense of humor. I always remember summers full of laughter around him. He would put on airs of a big-time gambler, strutting around wearing his favorite hat from Las Vegas. The expressions he used, his movements, never failed to bring out a laugh.

There was a serious side to him. Family bickerings always clouded his face. He never let anyone know what he was thinking or how he really felt during those days.

This summer, Mike got sick. I hardly saw him during the summer. No one knew it was serious until his son-in-law told us that Mike had cancer. I was stunned.

A few weeks after I found out, I went to see Mike in his office. I was shocked, for he had grown thin and pale. It was the first time that I realized he was not going to get better. It was the last time I saw him.

Mike died last week and I lost a very special friend. As I sat in the church at his funeral, I thought of the good times and the bad times. I replayed his smile, his laugh, and all the scenes of summer that came to my mind. One particular scene stands out:

I remember him standing under the maple tree and telling me that I was going to be the first girl to barefoot (waterski on my bare feet) on Christie Lake. I laughed at him then. Early this summer, I did it–but Mike was not around to share the glory [that first time]. When he finally came to the lake for a short visit, he sat in the boat and saw me barefoot. I’ll never forget the proud look on his face. That was the best memory Mike could have given me.

Karen and Mike

Karen barefooting

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