The elevator opened and it was the busiest place I had ever seen! There were kids everywhere. Dad went to the desk as Mom and I took a seat in the waiting area. We waited for a while, then a nurse called my name and we followed. We were brought to an examining room and the nurse asked my father to wait outside while I got undressed and put on a johnny. He then came back in and I was quickly bought down to x-ray. I don't know how many pictures they took, but it seemed like a lot. They took pictures from the front, back, and side. I was then brought back up to the room to rejoin my parents. We waited for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, two doctors entered the room. One was older; his name was Dr. James H. Hardy. He was a large man and because this reminded of the "other" doctor I spoke about earlier, I became somewhat frightened. Dr. Hardy introduced the younger doctor; his name was Dr. Edward Bradbury. Now, let me tell you - Dr. Bradbury was HANDSOME!! Oh boy, like I'm talking gorgeous!! He reminded my mother and me of a younger and thinner James Brolin. It was like Marcus Welby, MD revisited! For any of you younger than 40 that are reading this, you have no idea what I am talking about, I know! It didn't take long for me to learn that every woman and every young girl at Newington Children's Hospital was madly in love with him. I then repeated the same standing tests that I had already done so many times before and they asked tons of questions. I remember being mortified that one of them asked if I had my menstrual period yet, and my mother saying, "Oh yes, just this month, she had her first one!" - Like it was a proud Mother moment! OMG! I WANTED TO CRAWL UNDER THE EXAMINING TABLE!! How dare her tell them this?? How embarrassing! What was she thinking??
Finally, a nurse entered with the x-rays and Dr. Hardy proceeded to put them up on the lightboard and started using a pencil and writing on the x-rays. I had no idea what he was doing but later on learned that he was determining the measurement of the angle of the curves, which is called the Cobb-angle. Scoliosis curves are still measured this way today. I was so happy when Dr. Hardy didn't ignore me like the "other" doctor in Westerly had, instead he looked right at me and said, "Don't be scared honey, I'm going to take good care of you". He was so reassuring and in retrospect, he was really, really wonderful with children. There was something about him that I trusted and instantly I felt safe. Dr. Hardy may have been a large man, but there was absolutely nothing scary about him. He was a big teddy bear with the heartiest laugh I had ever heard. It was very loud and thunderous, but lovable. I felt completely at ease. It wasn't until I was much older that I realized that I wasn't really fearful because I was just too young to really comprehend what he was saying. I was 12, and not an overly tense or uptight child. Another way in which I was very different from my mother and my sister, Michele. Those two were the Type-A's of the family. Actually, that behavior type is quite prevalent on my mother's side of the family. In my youth, it escaped me thankfully. Perhaps that's why today, I find it comical when people think I am a nervous nelly or a worry-wart, because growing up in my family, I was considered very calm and very laid back. Good lord, maybe that Type-A behavior is showing up as I grow older? Sometimes, I actually think so. Not always, it just depends on what the issue is. I assure you though that back then, not too much riled me. Not even the scary words coming out of Dr. Hardy's mouth. It probably helped that I couldn't take my eyes off of Dr. Bradbury!
The bottom line was that I didn't just have just one curve. I didn't have two curves. Nope, lucky me - I had three! Almost unheard of. Even now, I have only met one other person with three curves and her third, or bottom curve, didn't appear until she was older. Scoliosis curves get measured in degrees (must be greater than 10* for a diagnosis) and usually appear as "C" shaped or "S" shaped and showing up in the thoracic and lumbar regions of the spine. Besides the curves, the spine generally "rotates" as well, which adds a whole new dimension to the term "twisted spine"! Due to the fact that I was not born with scoliosis (which would be called "congenital" scoliosis) and it showed up instead as an adolescent (between 11-17 yrs. old) and with no known cause, it is called Idiopathic Scoliosis. This was, and still is, the most common form of scoliosis. The doctors explained as much about scoliosis as they could in one sitting. Back then it was explained that my bones were growing but the exterior of my body hadn't started yet, so the spine had nowhere to grow, so it curved. One of the x-rays they performed is called a bone-age test. This x-ray is taken at the wrist. I recall that although I was chronicologically 12 years and 4 months, my bone age was 14 and 10 months. In layman’s terms, my insides were growing fasting than the shell of me! Although that is not entirely correct, it did make sense to me in my youth and I was better able to gain some sort of perspective as to what was happening to me. Today in 2009, the current consensus is that it is a multifactorial process that may include altered melatonin production, a connective tissue disorder, various skeletal muscle abnormalities, a contractile protein dysfunction or even some nerve function problem. There is even some research that states that women over the age of 27 are at higher risk of having a child develop scoliosis! I still don't think they really know. That consensus could change in ten more years because the knowledge and data surrounding scoliosis is changing all of the time. However, I do know that so much more is known now, 36 years later than when I was diagnosed and the treatment has as well too! Kids being diagnosed today have it so much better than we did, that's for sure. The doctors then explained that scoliosis happens more predominately in females and the newest studies at the time felt that you could always find some member in your family tree if you looked back just a little way and that I was sure to have a cousin or two eventually be diagnosed as well. However, I was a little different. They proceeded to say that curves beyond 50* made surgical candidates. Dr. Hardy took a deep breath and then informed us that my top curve was 82* and they felt it was pressing on my left lung; therefore they were concerned with the possibility of it collapsing my lung, which naturally could be life threatening. So that explained why I would become out of breath so easy and running was so hard. The second curve was measured at 67*, which was still considered pretty severe for the thoracic/lumbar portion of the spine. My 3rd or bottom curve was measured at 19* and sat very low in the lumbar/sacrum portion of the spine. They explained what their approach was going to be - and because Dr. Hardy was so kind and Dr. Bradbury was so cute, I actually wasn't scared at all. Hard to believe, but true.
They went on to explain that I would require two surgeries, 2 weeks apart, and I would be in the hospital approximately 6 weeks. I either didn't listen or didn't comprehend anything else they said. In that moment, I do recall thinking, "Yeah, no school for six weeks!". That sounded pretty sweet to me! Due to my age, I realize now how ignorant I was and I have such compassion for myself. I just didn't have a clue. I have no real recollection of the remainder of what was discussed between my parents and the doctors; I just sat there assuming that my mother would explain more to me later. We left mid-afternoon and headed home. The whole ride home, I couldn't quite shake the feeling that I was changing before my eyes and that the "Valerie" that was, would never be the same "Valerie" ever again. I may not have completely understood what I was facing, but I also knew that nothing would ever be the same again.
My mother did in fact, over the next couple of weeks, explain everything to me - in simpler terms and in bits and pieces that I could understand. Looking back, she was wonderful. She downplayed it all and I had no fear whatsoever. She was forthright and honest and she was not the type to "sugarcoat" anything (not her style!), actually she gave me no indication that this was any big deal. In fact, she just said that some kids have to endure so much worse and that I was more than strong enough to get through it. Period. She told me that it was planned that I would enter the hospital on the Friday after Thanksgiving for about two weeks. The plan was to put me in weighted traction for approximately two weeks, and then I would have a full body cast put on and discharged. The assumption was that the body cast would hold any straightening that the traction would have created. I would return on February 6, 1974. They would remove the cast, repeat traction for 5 days, do testing and labs and then I would have my first surgery on February 12, 1974. I've always remembered that because that is Lincoln's birthday. Then, I would have the second surgery exactly two weeks later on February 26. I would stay in the hospital for a month or so after that recovering and would you believe that I would even go to school there? Then I’d be discharged and everything would be perfect! Good to go! Cured, they said! I would go on and live a normal life and forget that I had ever went through it! No big deal. All fixed and set for life. Yep, their exact words were, "You're CURED. Go live your life." Hmmm.....cured.
Or........maybe not??
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