Author:
Jonathan
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Date Posted: 15:16:35 08/07/07 Tue
All of the responses generated from today’s post seem to come from the same types of people. While there is strength in numbers, I’ll take a bit of my time to offer you my perspective that, while still entirely positive, will be considerably different from almost all of your posters, since they’re mostly women anyway, and they all seem to have lived healthy, well-balanced lives. I am a man…if you can call someone turning twenty in December a “man” and not a “kid” or a teenager, or something—but, just for the sake of simplicity: I am a man…who was born with cerebral palsy, and thus was in need of “serious help” as a newborn and as a youngster. McNair’s use of “serious help” is what pushed me to the point of posting here for the first (and probably only) time, and professing this to you and your readers, because she has NO IDEA what “serious help” entails, or else I predict she would not have used the term so loosely in her attempt to degrade the wonderful Kellie Raspberry for attention or other means of “stirring the pot”.
(For those of you who don’t know what cerebral palsy is, I recommend Google or WebMD or some alternative. Most who have it are [some severely] lacking in motor and/or cognitive skills, in wheelchairs, what have you.)
I am a twin who was born several months premature—I can’t openly discuss the nature of my birth and what went wrong on public forum, but, for the record: my brother is completely healthy, and I, due to unforeseen circumstances, was born in need of “serious help”. My eyes were crossed, my muscles were spastic, including my heart (which almost stopped several times in my first few years—talk about giving my parents gray hairs…)—all truth be told, I was “destined to be almost completely incapable”. Not only were my developments late (obviously), but the doctors who diagnosed me said I would not be able to walk, talk, or control myself to some “normal” extent after the initial curing of my eyes and heart and (most) muscle spasms.
Considering the wordiness of my post, you can tell they were wrong in regards to speaking and self-control. You’re going to have to give me the benefit of the doubt when I say I can walk and run normally. There’s obviously extreme weakness in my legs that prevents me from climbing a hundred flights of stairs or driving to come see you guys from Florida, but—I’m alive and well and almost “normal” in spite of being born in need of “serious help”.
Everyone calls me some sort of miracle.
I call it good parenting. The personal closeness you feel for your daughter (i.e. the things you mentioned in today’s post) is the same personal closeness my parents had for me (not excluding my brother) that I believe made “severe cerebral palsy” become “mild cerebral palsy” in just a few short years. I grew up in my house as a “special child”, and that’s good and fine; the continual well-tidings and strong degree of faith spread uniformly throughout my entire family is probably the reason I’m even sitting here today. My parents have shown their worth to the world by raising two respectful, strong-willed adults, one who was at an obvious disadvantage.
But my life has not been without ridicule—not by a long-shot. Even though I am and have always been quite sane, while in middle school, my demeanor while carrying this disease (particularly not being able to participate in some of the hardcore sports activities they drilled into us through my middle school years) was not entirely normal, and thus I was dubbed “crippie” for quite some time. I only say this because McNair seems to characterize the same people that would bully me—she seems like someone middle-school aged; that’s right. Constructive criticism is fine and dandy—but what McNair said to you was nothing short of “horrible” (not to mention childish), just as those who bullied me years ago made me feel. And to criticize you about your own child, your pride and joy! I usually never wish evil on anyone, being primarily pacifistic—but it’s like you said: she definitely deserves some sort of “hoodoo voodoo”.
As far as her attack(s) on you personally…she is entirely off-base in everything she said there as well, which gives further justification to my “middle schooler” dribble from earlier. I don’t know a single girl, even my own girlfriend who I go out of my way to compliment very often, who is not considerably self-conscious about her weight. I congratulate you in all your endeavors regarding the subject at hand—to be back down to 150 is quite a feat, I’d imagine! To want to feel pampered and like shopping and have some small-to-noticeable degree of materialness is to be a normal, modern woman in American Society. There’s nothing wrong with that at all!
Your personality on (and probably off) the air shows some degree of originality though. And the particular restraint you showed in your comment to McNair impresses me as well. Most girls and older women I know would have torn her apart, you know?
“You go girl” seems to be the popular phrase going around regarding this subject.
I’m in your corner, too.
Yours,
Someone “Special”
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