Protection is another issue that coda’s face within the family unit. The hearing child may not interpret for their parents the insensitive remarks or comments made by a hearing person who assumed everyone in the family was deaf because they were all signing. 

Often times coda’s experience isolation and rejection from peers because they do not feel comfortable or want to associate with the deaf family members, thus creating a situation in which the coda cannot openly discuss emotions and feelings of rejection with their parents for fear of hurting their feelings. 

Children also may become hyper vigilant, listening for things that their parents could not hear such as monsters’, burglars, smoke alarms, and cracking sounds of the ceiling collapsing (Filer & Filer.) 

Many feel that this could be considered as role reversal’ and could later cause problems for the parent in later years when teenage trials and power struggles take place.

Another issue, which is perhaps the most critical, is the issue of communication between the deaf parent and the hearing child. Studies show that most deaf parents “have no particular problem” accepting their child’s ability to hear, but are “acutely aware” that parenthood forces them to address things “they have no knowledge about.”

The family power structure is greatly influenced by the flow of information

The flow of information in a hearing family is open within the family system and outside the family system to the larger community, but the flow of information changes drastically with the addition of a deaf member; moreover, it can be severely restricted when families with deaf and hearing members do not have a mutual communication system.

Although BSL is a legitimate language for family interaction, it is important to note that different dyads within a deaf-parented family could be using different communication systems, some BSL and other not. 

Deaf parents may use BSL between themselves but use a mixed mode of communication with their hearing children. Furthermore, communication between a deaf parent and a hearing child may not always be effective. 

The deaf parent may use fragmented speech to the child, but expect the child to sign back to them. This causes an obvious problem as to how the child is to learn sign when the parent is not signing to him/her. Thus, it is not unusual for the child to understand what the parent expresses, but not vice versa.

Parents may have a misguided notion that they should not sign with their child simply because the child is hearing, and some parents have reported not signing with their child in order to prevent the over reliance on their child to serve as their interpreter. 

Such parents elect to speak to their child with reduced speech clarity and probable ungrammatical form. The end result of this situation may be that the hearing child cannot sign and the parent-child relationship becomes restricted and asymmetrical.

In summary, parenting literature generally find that deaf parents are competent and caring and have excellent relationships with their hearing children. Although there are some specific issues involving communication, it does not appear that deaf parents are at a greater risk for serious family dysfunction than hearing parents of hearing children.