Life is about working towards your goals, right? When you’re deaf, you instantly have to work that bit harder, especially in group situations. For those of you that don’t know what competitive cheerleading is; it’s a mixture of stunting, tumbling, dance and jumps. It’s about teamwork and counts.
Small matters that hearing people wouldn’t even think of can suddenly become a safety issue. If I get the wrong counts, I could walk into someone doing a backflip or drop my flyer (the person we throw in the air). Thankfully, I’ve come across some amazing coaches and athletes who’ve helped me along the way. Working together we’d find ways to help ensure I’m on the right counts and doing the right things.
When I was on Team England Adaptive Abilities, we’d come up with loads of ways to help and keep me feeling included. I had a couple friends on the team that already knew BSL and then my coach searched high and low to find a way to help me keep to the music. In arenas, you aren’t always able to feel the music through the cheer mats, and music has no clarity. My coach found a vibrating device that I put on my ankle and she’d have the remote which she used to buzz it.