Teen Cerebral Palsy

Hey all!

I hope you had a nice weekend, it went by way too fast (like always) in my opinion! I can gladly say I am DONE with testing for college! SAT’s and ACT’s, goodbye. I took the ACT this Saturday, and I think I did pretty well…such a relief! Onto my next big task: AP English Mid-term on Tuesday ahh! But my friend Melanie is coming into town from Oregon so that’ll be super fun to see her….not to mention Halloween now only a week away!! My friends and I have decided to be superheroes: Redline is my friend Katelyn, Purple Fire is Sara, Mr. & Mrs. Black is Melanie and her boyfriend, Andre and last but not least, Pink Ice is  yours truly! So that’ll be a blast and definitely something to look forward to after I knock out the craziness of school. We’ll venture out to a party or two and then head back to my place to munch on some candy and hang out by our firepit! I almost forgot, we have to carve pumpkins sometime this week… Do you guys still partake in that tradition? Or are there any other Halloween traditions that you have continued throughout the years?

At the request of a TeenCP Mama, Karin (her cute lil baby Mia has Cerebral Palsy) I’ve been asked to think back to when I was a little girl myself, and share how CP affected me and what I did to gain such an optimistic outlook on living life with a physical disability. Now keep in mind, this is solely my experiences with CP…there are different severities, cases, and all sorts of issues that arise when it really comes down to it. I am extremely fortunate to be in the state of health that I am today, when I look back on my “diagnosis”, if you will, of Cerebral Palsy.

I was born three months pre-maturely as a twin (one of the most common occurrences of CP) and the doctor informed my parents that I was almost doomed to a life long fate of wheelchairs, speech and communication problems… basically, all things that encompassed a worst-case scenario of CP, was what I was regarded as, by this doctor. I had a level 4/5 bleed on the right, and a level 5/5 bleed on the left side of the brain. My parents were dumbfounded, probably in a state of shock for days on end…wondering if i was even going to survive!

A few weeks after this news, my mom was informed by another doctor that the brain has extraordinary healing powers; that no one can truly, factually say that I was going to ‘be’ a certain way. And well, fast- forward a few years later and that doctor was right! My mom says to this day, that it was her’s and my father’s ignorance of what CP was that made me as strong, and as physically capable as I am today. Personally, I’ve come to believe that my parents “ignorance” was not a bad thing at all; on the contrary… it is their upbringing that forced me to adapt to a lifestyle where maybe my brain wasn’t truly ready for, in lieu of having CP. But that didn’t matter, all I knew was that everything just took a bit more time, patience, and effort. As a child, I never once thought I was a victim of something. It just is what it is. To be completely honest, I didn’t educate myself about CP until I was about 12 or so, when my dad asked me, have you ever looked up what Cerebral Palsy–the term– actually means? I just simply wasn’t aware of my condition. Yeah, there were times when I had to explain it to new people that I met, but it was always something I played off as just something that made me have to try that much harder to keep up with every one else. Instead of crawling my dad said I’d “army crawl”-literally. When I was three, I wobbled around with a walker. When I was eight, I learned how to ride a bike.  All that was on my mind was, “do what Sara does, ride a skateboard on your stomach if you must, so you can go off with Matt and Sara while they skateboarded ‘normally’ around the neighborhood…I really just did what I had to do to do the things that all my siblings and friends were doing at the time. It wasn’t ever a problem because I didn’t know any different.

As I got older I became aware that I walked different, that I was slower and less coordinated than my twin sis, that people may judge me…but that didn’t affect my all too much. I was still just like them, I could still have fun, laugh, and enjoy life as I am. I have days where I am down, but those are becoming less frequent because I have the quality of life that would not be possible, had I not been born with Cerebral Palsy.

I really believe that the human brain is your ultimate control center, that if you really NEED to do something, your body will adapt in miraculous ways so that you can accomplish what you set out to do. It’s definitely not easy, but it’s possible. That goes for anyone: “normal,” physical, or even mental disabilities aside…the brain has the power to adapt-if you allow it to. Does it sound absurd? Maybe. Why do I believe this concept? Because I feel that I’ve experienced it. Let me ask you this: have you ever had that moment when you just think, “wow I am done, I cannot possibly go any further, try any harder than this, stretch any longer. There is just no way.” Have you ever gone past that point? Beyond the limits? (as Mr. Bonner Paddock would know so well) *see resources* Because if you have not, I strongly recommend putting yourself in that position. Test yourself, go to failure, and I know you will be amazed at what you can do.

I could go on and on…and on and on, but I think I’ll stop here for now. There are so many things on my mind right now that I could go into, so many instances that I could bring up so we can just say “to be continued.”

I enjoy writing so much, especially about things that are so powerful as this. I also hope that my experiences feel relatable to some of you teens out there…or even to those have friends or kids with CP like Karin and her daughter, Mia. It means a lot to me that you continue to take time out of your day to read my posts.

Have a great Monday everyone!

-Katy