TIn Lithuania, inclusive education is legally embedded in the Law on Education and its 2020 amendments, which guarantee children with disabilities the right to attend mainstream schools on an equal basis and ensure access to necessary support and non-discrimination. The law also provides Deaf pupils with a formal opportunity to learn Lithuanian Sign Language. At the international level, inclusive education is closely linked to human rights, equality, and social justice. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) and the World Federation of the Deaf (WFD) emphasise the right of Deaf people, as a linguistic and cultural minority, to full and meaningful participation in education. This paper presents the results of qualitative research exploring how adult Deaf individuals retrospectively interpret and make sense of their experiences in mainstream schooling in Lithuania. The study seeks to illuminate the complex reality of deaf education, where linguistic and cultural dimensions intersect within the framework of inclusive education. The literature review draws on transformative equality theory, arguing that inclusive education requires not only formal access but structural transformation of linguistic norms, cultural recognition, and participatory frameworks within mainstream schooling. Particular attention is given to the linguistic and cultural dimensions of Deaf identity within this equality paradigm. The research is based on semi-structured interviews with adult Deaf participants and employs interpretativephenomenologicalanalysis(IPA).The findings reveal that mainstream schooling was frequently experienced as isolating and implicitly segregating, while Lithuanian Sign Language emerged as a crucial condition for recognition, belonging, and participation. The study suggests that inclusive education for Deaf learners requires transformative structural change grounded in principles of equality to ensure linguistic rights and cultural recognition.