Geeske draws situations she experiences in daily life. Things that are very common for hearing people take a lot of energy from Geeske. Like following a conversation. “Normally you immediately hear what someone is saying. For me it is a puzzle piece. I have to know the context, I have to read lips, see the emotions on someone’s face. I have to put together all the fragments of the things I do hear to make a picture And even then it’s not always right. Then I have to ask to repeat it, it’s very intensive. So my battery is drained much faster. I have to make trade-offs very often, drop things and sometimes spend a day on the couch lie down to recover. Sometimes I also have to take a hearing break. Then I take off my hearing aids and say, I’m not here for a while. That is sometimes really necessary.”
How do you communicate with someone who is hard of hearing? Artist Geeske van Voorthuijzen is hard of hearing himself and makes drawings with tips
