Amy1976
06-13-03, 08:27 PM
Okay... I apologize now for the length!
On October 27, 1976, a baby girl was born. I was that girl. I am the epitome of uniqueness. I spent my first few months of life in an incubator. I was born pre-maturely, month and four days to be precise. I spent my first Halloween and Christmas in the hospital. When I came home all seemed normal. The youngest child of four, I have one sister and two brothers. I grew up in the same house from birth. I didn’t know anything else besides my own safe world of that house. At the age of four, we were supposed to go on vacation to Florida and other tourist educational spots. Well I missed the first two days of that trip. My mother took me to the doctors for a routine check-up and they found something odd in my body. So during the two days they ran a battery of tests and sent us on out way. It would take a long time for all the results to be ready. I enjoyed Florida. I have the pictures to show for it. I have few but very vivid memories of that trip. Dancing with Jiminy Cricket was my favorite. I wonder now who was really in that suit that made my trip so memorable. When I came home from that trip I began kindergarten. My mother told me how my first day went. She still wonders how the bus driver didn’t freak out. She told me I threw myself in front of the bus on the ground and refused to get up and when she picked me up I had a hold of the handrail so tight that my hands turned white. Soon after the test results were in. I have a rare disease. Well it was rare at the time. I have “CVAH”. (Congenital Virilizing Adrenal Hyperplasia) Which means I don’t produce the right amount of the different hormones that require the body to function normally. This meant a lifetime of blood tests and urinalysis to adjust the numerous medications that I would have to take for the rest of my life. As you can see from the beginning of my childhood, I was extremely different from all the other children. I remember being asked why I go to the doctors so much. My reply was that I have a disease. Well at that age this meant that I had cooties. So I didn’t have many friends. Unless they were new to the school and I had them get to know before I said anything about my disease. Even then some of them stopped talking to me. This taught me that being different was not the thing to be. As I grew I up didn’t tell people about my disease anymore. I figured that it didn’t harm them so why should they know. Thus I began hiding myself from the world. In turn this made me very introverted. I sucked my thumb and pulled my hair out. I think it was out of pure nervousness. Again this made me different. I was always half bald and had a lump on my thumb that made it look weird. I stopped all that and tried everything to fit in and to be liked. This never happened. I can remember being chased down the street by a lot of my classmates. I can also remember the crossing guard, yelling at them to leave me alone. They didn’t but it slowed them down most days so I could make it into my house in one piece. Just writing that makes me start to cry. I soon found out that I was strong for a girl and began using that to my advantage. They stopped chasing me, but I also lost a lot of friends because their parents didn’t want them hanging out with the freak. This made me even more alone. I asked my mother at one point if I were adopted, thinking maybe that was the reason I got this disease. I started to create my own little world. I remember a small closet in the house I grew up in. I still don’t know what it was for. I think it was a design mistake of the house. Even so, I made that the place where I was free. No one could hurt me in there. Needless to say I spent a lot of time in that closet. My mother called it the dollhouse. I guess it would be because the figurines in dollhouses are always too big for the house itself. Well that was I. In the dollhouse I was larger than life. It made me feel empowered. When I reached adolescence not only did I have to deal with my unique body changing, but I also had to deal with moving out of my safe house and into a whole new world. I was heart broken when I was told we were moving. I remember going there the last day that we were to be aloud in the house, and just walking around every room and every closet even the attic I walked through there too. I just wanted to remember everything. I still do. I know that sounds a little unorthodox, but that’s how much I didn’t want to leave my safe world for a new unknown one. When I started at the new school, I remember walking into the building saying to myself “This time it will be different.” No one knew me so I could reinvent myself. No such luck. All I had dealt with as a child that had made me so introverted wouldn’t let me be anything but that. I didn’t tell anyone about my disease, except a few select people. But then it would start all over again and the shunning would begin. I never had the high school experience that everyone talks about. Maybe that’s all it is, just a bunch of talk. Oh, how I dreamed of it though. I spent most of my high school life watching my nephew. I never went to the prom, or joined activities. I guess you could say my childhood was stumped before it ever began. Here’s what I remember in a nutshell, the name-calling, belittling, and the feeling of unworthiness. I did the normal thing and went to college. I excelled in the classes, but not socially. Again my life was still on the same path as it had always been. I did however meet one girl. We had a class together that we both despised. She was a year behind me. Over the semester we became friends. At least as close I have ever been to a real friend. When I told her about my disease, she didn’t run away screaming. Through her I met her brother. I liked him instantly. I didn’t rush into anything. I found that didn’t work for me in the past. Slowly we became friends and more. When I told him about my disease, again another person that didn’t run away screaming. That was what I had prayed for all of my life was to find someone to understand me for me. Soon after I quit school. I know that was stupid. I have him and he is my world. He embraces me for all of my faults. My dollhouse got a little bit bigger. The only thing I regret is not having a career that provides health insurance. I no longer take those pills that I need for the rest of my life. In the nine years since I last had them my body has really changed. I have grown hair like a man, and nothing will help it. I shave in the morning and have five o’ clock shadow by two o’ clock. The rash on my legs from shaving is so bad that I don’t shave unless I need to. Surprisingly he is still with me and has been for the past six years. He says still that none of this bothers him, but I often wonder. Way in the back of my mind I wonder if he would rather be with a normal girl. I know no one is normal and that the word “normal” shouldn’t even exist in the English language. The word normal means jealousy to me. I would rather be fat than diseased. Fat is unhealthy and somewhat unacceptable in society but it is more acceptable than being diseased. Anywhere I go I look around me and see normal girls and wish I were they for even just one day. I wonder how it would feel to be part of the in crowd, to be liked, to be popular. Just to be normal in any sense of the word. Because of the jealousy I resent everyone. I envy them at the same time. I am still introverted, but I have someone in my life who I can be who I really am inside, and nothing else matters, but if I ever did find a Jeanie in a bottle and was granted one wish, it would be to be admired for who I am inside and that the outside wouldn’t matter by everyone in the world. I wouldn’t have to put up with the snickers behind my back and wonder what people are saying about me when I leave the room. Having this disease has been the monster on my back and will never go away. So I am like an alcoholic who never was. I take everything one day at a time and don’t trust anyone. I know I am different, unique in fact, and that makes me special. That’s what my mother says. I love her for that.
:) :cool: AMY :cool: :)
On October 27, 1976, a baby girl was born. I was that girl. I am the epitome of uniqueness. I spent my first few months of life in an incubator. I was born pre-maturely, month and four days to be precise. I spent my first Halloween and Christmas in the hospital. When I came home all seemed normal. The youngest child of four, I have one sister and two brothers. I grew up in the same house from birth. I didn’t know anything else besides my own safe world of that house. At the age of four, we were supposed to go on vacation to Florida and other tourist educational spots. Well I missed the first two days of that trip. My mother took me to the doctors for a routine check-up and they found something odd in my body. So during the two days they ran a battery of tests and sent us on out way. It would take a long time for all the results to be ready. I enjoyed Florida. I have the pictures to show for it. I have few but very vivid memories of that trip. Dancing with Jiminy Cricket was my favorite. I wonder now who was really in that suit that made my trip so memorable. When I came home from that trip I began kindergarten. My mother told me how my first day went. She still wonders how the bus driver didn’t freak out. She told me I threw myself in front of the bus on the ground and refused to get up and when she picked me up I had a hold of the handrail so tight that my hands turned white. Soon after the test results were in. I have a rare disease. Well it was rare at the time. I have “CVAH”. (Congenital Virilizing Adrenal Hyperplasia) Which means I don’t produce the right amount of the different hormones that require the body to function normally. This meant a lifetime of blood tests and urinalysis to adjust the numerous medications that I would have to take for the rest of my life. As you can see from the beginning of my childhood, I was extremely different from all the other children. I remember being asked why I go to the doctors so much. My reply was that I have a disease. Well at that age this meant that I had cooties. So I didn’t have many friends. Unless they were new to the school and I had them get to know before I said anything about my disease. Even then some of them stopped talking to me. This taught me that being different was not the thing to be. As I grew I up didn’t tell people about my disease anymore. I figured that it didn’t harm them so why should they know. Thus I began hiding myself from the world. In turn this made me very introverted. I sucked my thumb and pulled my hair out. I think it was out of pure nervousness. Again this made me different. I was always half bald and had a lump on my thumb that made it look weird. I stopped all that and tried everything to fit in and to be liked. This never happened. I can remember being chased down the street by a lot of my classmates. I can also remember the crossing guard, yelling at them to leave me alone. They didn’t but it slowed them down most days so I could make it into my house in one piece. Just writing that makes me start to cry. I soon found out that I was strong for a girl and began using that to my advantage. They stopped chasing me, but I also lost a lot of friends because their parents didn’t want them hanging out with the freak. This made me even more alone. I asked my mother at one point if I were adopted, thinking maybe that was the reason I got this disease. I started to create my own little world. I remember a small closet in the house I grew up in. I still don’t know what it was for. I think it was a design mistake of the house. Even so, I made that the place where I was free. No one could hurt me in there. Needless to say I spent a lot of time in that closet. My mother called it the dollhouse. I guess it would be because the figurines in dollhouses are always too big for the house itself. Well that was I. In the dollhouse I was larger than life. It made me feel empowered. When I reached adolescence not only did I have to deal with my unique body changing, but I also had to deal with moving out of my safe house and into a whole new world. I was heart broken when I was told we were moving. I remember going there the last day that we were to be aloud in the house, and just walking around every room and every closet even the attic I walked through there too. I just wanted to remember everything. I still do. I know that sounds a little unorthodox, but that’s how much I didn’t want to leave my safe world for a new unknown one. When I started at the new school, I remember walking into the building saying to myself “This time it will be different.” No one knew me so I could reinvent myself. No such luck. All I had dealt with as a child that had made me so introverted wouldn’t let me be anything but that. I didn’t tell anyone about my disease, except a few select people. But then it would start all over again and the shunning would begin. I never had the high school experience that everyone talks about. Maybe that’s all it is, just a bunch of talk. Oh, how I dreamed of it though. I spent most of my high school life watching my nephew. I never went to the prom, or joined activities. I guess you could say my childhood was stumped before it ever began. Here’s what I remember in a nutshell, the name-calling, belittling, and the feeling of unworthiness. I did the normal thing and went to college. I excelled in the classes, but not socially. Again my life was still on the same path as it had always been. I did however meet one girl. We had a class together that we both despised. She was a year behind me. Over the semester we became friends. At least as close I have ever been to a real friend. When I told her about my disease, she didn’t run away screaming. Through her I met her brother. I liked him instantly. I didn’t rush into anything. I found that didn’t work for me in the past. Slowly we became friends and more. When I told him about my disease, again another person that didn’t run away screaming. That was what I had prayed for all of my life was to find someone to understand me for me. Soon after I quit school. I know that was stupid. I have him and he is my world. He embraces me for all of my faults. My dollhouse got a little bit bigger. The only thing I regret is not having a career that provides health insurance. I no longer take those pills that I need for the rest of my life. In the nine years since I last had them my body has really changed. I have grown hair like a man, and nothing will help it. I shave in the morning and have five o’ clock shadow by two o’ clock. The rash on my legs from shaving is so bad that I don’t shave unless I need to. Surprisingly he is still with me and has been for the past six years. He says still that none of this bothers him, but I often wonder. Way in the back of my mind I wonder if he would rather be with a normal girl. I know no one is normal and that the word “normal” shouldn’t even exist in the English language. The word normal means jealousy to me. I would rather be fat than diseased. Fat is unhealthy and somewhat unacceptable in society but it is more acceptable than being diseased. Anywhere I go I look around me and see normal girls and wish I were they for even just one day. I wonder how it would feel to be part of the in crowd, to be liked, to be popular. Just to be normal in any sense of the word. Because of the jealousy I resent everyone. I envy them at the same time. I am still introverted, but I have someone in my life who I can be who I really am inside, and nothing else matters, but if I ever did find a Jeanie in a bottle and was granted one wish, it would be to be admired for who I am inside and that the outside wouldn’t matter by everyone in the world. I wouldn’t have to put up with the snickers behind my back and wonder what people are saying about me when I leave the room. Having this disease has been the monster on my back and will never go away. So I am like an alcoholic who never was. I take everything one day at a time and don’t trust anyone. I know I am different, unique in fact, and that makes me special. That’s what my mother says. I love her for that.
:) :cool: AMY :cool: :)