I'm not here because I was raped or mugged, or shot at.

I'm here because I was operated on again and again and again.

I was born with cerebral palsy. At 7, my parents sent me to a funny farm for "non-compliance" After 1 and a half years, I was sent home for "refusing help." My father screamed a lot. My mother sang sarcastic songs. I hit my sister. My teachers dealt with problems by locking me in storage rooms.

Then it really gets bad. At 12, I underwent a tendon release. Something went drastically wrong and I woke up screaming. I have permanent nerve damage from the knees down. Then my back went. They operated. Within a year, it caved in and I went in again...twice. 2nd of the two operations, a lung collapsed and I woke up in ICU with a tube down my throat. While on the road to recovery, I broke my leg in the hospital after my leg got tangled in a blanket.
Normally you wear a plastic backbrace for 6 months to a year following the surgery. I wore mine into university after the third back operation.

I went out of my way to avoid other people in high school and at some point, I retreated to my room and I stayed there. And it just went downhill from there.

I learned to keep my mouth shut where medical problems are involved, the only time the surgeons have intervened are when my parents have noticed something wrong or I've ended up with pain severe enough to wind up in the ER.

I've roamed downtown Ottawa for years with a dislocated hip knowing what would happen if I saw a doctor, surgery and I would wake up screaming or worse, not at all.

I feel angry, guilty and scared. I cried once in my shrink's office, a rare act for some one who doesn't want to feel anything at all. He said I wasn't crying over the future,but the past.

The past is my future and the future is the past. They will have to be coming for my remaining hip and they will have to put me in traction. Too close to 1983 for comfort.

And I expect my life to be nasty, brutish and short.