Cara Miller, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist, and she says that she could “not have succeeded on my quest for my doctorate without the incredible foundation of support, guidance, and encouragement laid down by my family, friends, community, and teachers.” “I completed my clinical training as a psychotherapist providing counseling to young adults seeking services through their university’s Counseling Centers. Clinically, my therapeutic expertise is in areas of identity development, trauma, grief and loss, disability, deafness, and LGBTQ issues. I’m currently working towards my licensure as a Clinical Psychologist, with the goal of opening a private practice in which I can provide therapy to hearing, D/deaf, hard of hearing clients. Professionally and personally, I enjoy wearing a variety of hats, as an advocate, counselor, consultant, educator, author, and public speaker.” “I was 18 months old,” notes Miller, “when my severe-to-profound hearing loss was identified. My hearing parents were distressed and dismayed -- but not discouraged -- by the warnings about deaf children’s poor prognoses in language and education so often proffered by doctors, educators, and other professionals at the time. My parents explored many different educational options for me...From first through sixth grades I was fully mainstreamed and accompanied to all of my classes by a Cued Language Transliterator (CLT). I excelled academically despite a growing, increasingly-urgent sense of selfconsciousness about being deaf, being different.” At that time, Miller decided to attend Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut, a private liberal arts school with undergraduate and graduate programs. There, she “was excited to discover that the roster of Wesleyan’s unique language and culture-based housing included a ‘Sign Language House,’ founded in 1984. The only deaf student on campus, I lived in the Sign Language House and appreciated the ready-made community of hearing students who were learning sign language and interested in deaf-related issues….My understanding of ASL grammar and vocabulary expanded along with my interest in exploring for myself the very same D/deaf-related issues that we discussed in the classroom. I decided to spend the Fall semester of my Junior year as a Visiting Student immersed in the ‘foreign’ language and cultural environment of Gallaudet University. There I studied Deafness in Literature, Psychology, Culture, Sociology, and Theater, for the first time experiencing the comforts and challenges of attending classes in an all-signing environment.”
“I excelled academically [in the mainstream] despite a growing, urgent sense of self consciousness about being deaf, being different” Cara Miller