Born deaf, Grand Canyon athletic trainer Sean Stoeppel puts no limits on his life
Sean Stoeppel is eager to start his career as an athletic trainer at Grand Canyon University, working with the women's soccer team that is set to open the season on Aug. 17.
He also wants to be an ambassador for the deaf community.
Born deaf, receiving a cochlear implant at 13 months, Stoeppel is hoping to inspire people like him, who got the help he needed to succeed in life growing up in Brookfield, Connecticut.
Stoeppel's parents put him into a mainstream school. He succeeded in the classroom and on the soccer field, played as a defender collegiately at Endicott, became a member of the USA men's deaf national soccer team, and recently earned his doctoral degree in athletic training from Indiana State.
Now at 23, Stoeppel feels he's got much to offer, not only helping injured athletes, but letting deaf children know there's hope as they navigate the world.
"It's been a constant progress (with technology)," said Stoeppel, who has had three surgeries for the cochlear implant. "I think 24 years ago, nobody would have thought I'd be 23 with a doctorate living across the country, just living a normal, functioning life."
Sports in his blood
Sean's father, Craig Stoeppel, was an offensive lineman on Syracuse's 1987 football team that went 11-0-1 and finished ranked fourth in the final AP poll, after playing to a 16-16 tie with Auburn in the Sugar Bowl.
Football wasn't an option for Sean, who grew to be 6-foot-4, 205 pounds, due to the surgically implanted cochlear. He received his first implant on the right side of his head, near his ear, when he was 13 months. The implant on his left side went in when he was in sixth grade.
"My dad was a very big football player," Sean said. "He played in a couple of bowls. It was assumed I probably would have done that, too. But cochlear-implanted children can't wear a helmet in sports. The risk of head injuries was way too high.
"From there, we asked my audiologist that I worked with since birth, what sports? The one my parents threw out was soccer. My audiologist was like, 'Why not?' Once I took off running, I've yet to stop running."
Still, soccer came with risks because of his implant.
“It’s different when I played soccer in high school and college. I played with my processors on. I play without them when I play with the deaf team. I like to get into the games, I like to yell at the refs. I like to talk to the other teams. I like to talk to the fans. It’s fuel to the fire.
“A normal game, if I have the option, yes, I’ll wear it, because it helps with the communication. But there are times when I go up for a header, it can be only so strong before it rips through the skins, so it’s going to fall off, he said, adding he will plead with opponents, “Please, don’t step on my processor.”
Stoeppel added volleyball, golf, pickleball, baseball and basketball to his activities. But soccer was always his primary sport.
Stoeppel said he's not sure why he was born deaf. The family did genetic testing, but it didn't reveal anything. He said his mom, Susan, was sick while she was pregnant with him. That's been theorized as a reason. He failed the newborn hearing screening right away at Danbury Hospital. And the dominoes began to fall.
Initially, they tried hearing aids, but it couldn't amplify what he didn't have, Stoeppel said.
Having the cochlear implant so young was important to his parents.
"We live in Brookfield, Connecticut, and we wanted to, when he grew up, to go into the deli and be able to order something," said Susan Stoeppel, Sean's mom. "Or sit in a restaurant and be able to have a conversation with the person next to him.
"There were challenges certainly. But we are a hearing family. We live in a hearing world. He might be deaf, but he's a deaf-hearing child, and we wanted him to have those opportunities."
Thriving in mainstream schooling
With new research coming out, he was implanted at 13 months in order to help his speech growing up. He still had to undergo speech therapy. He saw an audiologist once a week until he was 18. He got help from the school district to make sure he was up on his assignments. He was having a lot of support from his school that his mom had to fight for.
He embraced mainstream school. But he admits it was difficult at times to feel he could fit in.
"It seemed normal to me, because that's all I had known," Stoeppel said. "But as I look back on it, all the interruptions in class, the side eyes, all the attention on me, a young kid, I liked it. As I got older, I didn't appreciate it as much.
"I used to have a big box on the back of my bag with a wire running up. It was a lot more obvious,'' he said.
He has a right and left side processor that go behind the ears. He doesn't always wear both processors at the same time. His right processor is more developed. There was a callback on the left side the following year after it was implanted when he was in the sixth grade. He had to have surgery again and have it replanted.
"This is how it was described to me, that if you have your arm in a sling for 13 years, you take it out of the sling, you're not going to have full mobility," Stoeppel said. "The same thing happens to the nerves (in the ear) that didn't have any feedback for 13, 14 years. It sounded a lot rougher. Very staticy. Very garbled, mushed sound. As time progressed, it's gotten better. But in the eighth grade, ninth grade, 10th grade, I didn't want that uncomfortableness. I had very short hair back then. Me, being a little more sensitive, I didn't like the attention of seeing both implants on me."
His hair is longer now, and the implants are more hidden behind his hair. He didn't grow his hair out to hide the implants, but he said he doesn't want people see he has something on his head and be treated differently.
He still needs to have checkups to adjust the devices. In college, it was easy to make an appointment to do quick adjustments.
Insurance was often a challenge for his parents. Sean got help through an audiologist, Jessica VanDerFeen, who set him on the path for where he needed to go. "She helped me and my parents to fight for me," he said.
Support from USA soccer
GCU women's soccer coach Chris Cissell, who was born without one arm, felt Stoeppel would be a great fit for the team.
"It makes sense for a guy who was born with one arm to hire a deaf guy, right? " Cissell said, adding that he has done a great job working with the team. "He's phenomenal at what he does. He has an extreme love and passion for the game. All the girls, everyone in the soccer family, loves him. It's been a really good start to the season for us, having him on staff."
Stoeppel said he still plays for the USA men's national deaf soccer team, but he won't be playing in competition this fall due to his athletic training work at GCU.
Having that support from USA Soccer, Stoeppel said, has been great, because, "Not only does it help to advocate for the deaf program, but it helps those that are 3, 4, 5, 6, just discovering their hearing loss, wondering what will I be able to do?"
"We serve as inspiration, advocates, and I think the big piece is education, because without the education the normal hearing population know it," he said. "I inform them. But someone walking down the street, I want them to be able to see a cochlear implant or someone just using hand gestures to sign, to be able to say, 'OK, they're deaf, I understand what that is.' I know how not to be judgmental. I shouldn't have to feel that if I apply for a job, if I want to play this sport, I shouldn't be restricted. We have the same opportunities.
"I'm not trying to boost myself. But as a doctorate at 23 years old, working in the medical world, flying all over the world, playing soccer, playing all of these other sports, I hope to some others who read this article, read other information about the deaf culture and awareness, know that they can do it,'' he said. "Even those without cochlear implants, they have wonderful opportunities. I'm just blessed that my family took on the choice of utilzing cochlear implant technologies that allow me to be able to be mainstream and get to this place."
To suggest human-interest story ideas and other news, reach Obert atrichard.obert@arizonarepublic.com or 602-316-8827. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter@azc_obert
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Born deaf, GCU athletic trainer Sean Stoeppel puts no limits on life
