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Continual Loss

Name: Catherine S. Perel
Email: perel@feist.com
Date: 30 Oct 1999
Time: 09:22:28
Remote Name: fsict-tc1-30.fn.net

Story

I broke my neck when I was 12 -- neary 21 years ago. I didn't know everything I would lose. I didn't have the experience to know. As I aged, I learned what I lost ... and I keep learning what I lost.

It isn't always medical or disability related. It's activities, invitations, things I wanted to do and things I'll never do. When I broke my neck, I knew I wouldn't walk again or play the clarinet. Those were forever gone, and I knew it.

What I didn't know was that my upper body joints would wear down so quickly. I wasn't aware of the difficulties of being disabled, a graduate student, and running a household separately, let alone compiled upon one another.

I didn't know that after a while, I would start losing sensation and physical ability. I wasn't prepared for 41 surgeries (45 by the end of March). I wasn't prepared for a latex allergy. I wasn't prepared to be an adult, let alone a disabled adult.

I will not accept my disability (C5-6 quad), for I find it inherently unacceptable. I will tolerate it, acknowledge it, adapt to it, and continue. I will not accept it ... ever.

The most I can say is that, while my disability and I have an uneasy truce, there are times when skirmishes and even full blown wars occur between us: my disability and I, but how was I to know at 12 that I would eventually be unable to bear children? That's a new loss to mourn. And these new losses are continuous, for at 12, what do you know of disability?

Copyright © 1999 Catherine S. Perel. All rights reserved.

Last changed: October 20, 2003

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