Froggy

Meet Froggy.  Also known as a Milwaukee Brace.   These are worn for Scheurermann's Disease, something I was diagnosed with when I was about 12.  I wore a brace similar to this every day for 23 hours a day for 2.5 years.  My friends and I nicknamed him Froggy because when it was sitting on the floor, the two pads that fit at the base of my skull and the one under my chin, looked like a frogs eyes and tongue.

This was traumatic to wear.  Growing up with a skin disease wasn't.  This had grown men and woman staring at me.  This had people calling me cripple.  I couldn't sit in a bucket seat car, my body would slide down, but the brace would slide up and strangle me (slightly funny but painful). 

BUT wearing this brace was the best thing to ever happen in my life and I wouldn't trade it for anything.  I learned how to be compassionate to others.  I learned to laugh at myself, how to help people be comfortable with uncomfortable things and how to get out of class, a lot!

I wore this all through my Jr High life.  Every single hour, I would say I needed to adjust my brace and I needed my friend to help me.  So I had an open pass for +1 for the whole year, and I would just go to the class room of one or the other of my friends and we would take off for the hour.  Mind you, I could get in and out of the brace all by myself in 2 seconds!  As a matter of fact.....I got my brace for the first time right after my birthday in July.  My mother worked part-time and was gone all day from about 9am to 4pm.   As soon as she would leave, I would tell my brother I was going to my friend Sandy's house.  As soon as I got to Sandy's, that brace was OFF!  Then, around 4pm, brace would go back on, I would go home, Mom would get home and I would say to Mom brace was on all day, can I take it off and go swimming?  Well, the first check up at the dr comes up and I have my Xrays....the curve in my spine is 4 degrees WORSE!  BUSTED!  I honestly thought my Mom was going to kill me that day.   She said "when you're dad hears about this...."   One of the other things that happens at the check ups at the dr is they adjust the brace, so you would get a prescription and have to go to rehab office and they would either fit you for a new mold or adjust the pads on the back or move the bars, or whatever.  Well THIS time, they added a new bar, for a padlock, yes, a padlock.  My parents padlocked me into the brace.  They figured if I couldn't be trusted, then they would make sure I couldn't get out it.  

I recently was at a spinal clinic for my arthritis and had told the dr this, find the story amusing myself, the dr was thoroughly offended.  "How could your parents lock you in a brace!" and I thought "don't you get it? I was being a little brat! I deserved it."  

I was only locked in it for 3 months.  The next dr visit my back was improving and they actually had to change the mold so I had to get new bars, they didn't add the padlock back.  I learned my lesson.

There were some things I hated about the brace. I always had to wear a t-shirt under it or else you would develop horrible rashes, and sometimes even that didn't help.  The part under the chin would cause rashes in the summer, we would line it with mole skin, but that didn't help and I would always walk around with a handkerchief folding up and hanging under there.  The rashes were miserable.   I couldn't bend at the waist, ever.  So you learn how to compensate but picking things up off the ground was always an adventure.

One time we were playing basketball in the gym at lunch, myself and another guy were running to get the ball, another guy from another court was running and didn't see me, we collided and I ended up on the ground flat on my back, he started yelling "I KILLED HER, I KILLED HER" freaking out.  That just made me laugh harder and I looked like a turtle trying to get up.  Finally a friend came over and grabbed the front bar of my brace and yanked me up, again, sending me into laughter. 

Oh and that was the funniest part, people treated me like I was piece of porcelain when in truth, all you had to do was grab a bar and yank and I was coming with you anywhere.  One other girl in my school ended up getting a brace after I did, we became brace buddies, she and I would walk up to each other, grab our front bars and just shake each other.  Talk about whip lash!   My friends know I am ticklish, so they would take a pen and run it down my spine between the bars and watch me scream and jump.   Oh god, and don't remind me about getting an itch under all that plastic mold.  UGH the worst.  I would start hitting myself in an effort to make the brace move so the itch would get some relief. 

One night, I fell out of bed, the space between my desk and bed was just the right size for my garbage can, and garbage can, just the right size for my head.  My shoulder went under the bed and the other was against the corner of the desk, and because of the brace, I couldn't slide down, roll over, or sit up.  I ended up dozing off again.  My brother found me that way when he came to check on me and why I didn't get up for school.

As my back got better, the hours I wore my brace decreased.  From 23 hrs a day, to 20 hrs, to 18 hrs, to 15 hrs, and so on.  When I was just about to enter HS it was down to 8 hrs, so all I was doing was sleeping in it.  The duckling was about to become a swan.  I went to the dr for my check up and he said "no more brace for you" and I said "what? I thought you were gonna say every other night?" and he said "No, you are done, I don't need to see you again."

That night, I slept with the brace on one more night.  I didn't know how to sleep without it.  To this day, my Mom still laughs at me for that.  But I did sleep without it the next night.  That brace stayed in my room for week before I put it away, but I wouldn't let my mom throw it away for 8 years.  She didn't understand why I couldn't part with it.  The funny thing is there are only 2 pictures that I know of of me in that brace.  For all those days and nights in Froggy, and only 2 pictures.  Such an impact, never to be forgotten.