When I was a baby, I was diagnosed with cerebral palsy.* They
did physical therapy on me and really, there seems to be no
traces left by the time I was school age, except for stutter,
which was fixed when I was in the 3rd Grade.* I became a really
fast runner, gifted musician, creative thinker, academically
excellent, a natural to computers and kids, a little "quirky"
but uniquely clever and smart.* On report cards they'd say, "He
beats to his own drummer". Yet, the ghost of Cerebral Palsy
always haunts me.* When I was 21, I volunteered full time for a
year at the same Cerebral Palsy Center that I went to when I was
pre-school age, for physical and occupational therapy, to try to
get a better understanding of my origins. Now I'm 43.* i
thought, "Let me look at Wikipedia". *Difficulty in tracking CP
progression through the later years Unusually, cerebral palsy,
including spastic cerebral palsy, is notable for a glaring
overall research deficiency*the fact that it is one of the very
few major groups of conditions on the planet in human beings for
which medical science has not yet (as of 2011) collected
wide-ranging empirical data on the development and experiences
of young adults, the middle aged and older adults.* Well, I'm
raising my hand.* If anybody out there wants a willing research
subject for "Where are the success cases of physical /
occupational therapy for cerebral palsy who are now adults?" I'm
here.* Poke away.* You wouldn't know i have it.* Nobody would
unless I tell them.* Even then, there's no way to "see it".*
I'm....* surprisingly - normal.* Yes, I can use that word on
myself. Yet I still have to wonder: What happened to that bit of
brain that wasn't quite right?* Or the neurons that were
misfiring?* Where'd they go?* They're still in here. They're
buried up there. But... ...where? What does the circuitry look
like? Maybe it's impossible to find.* Yet it's hard to believe
it doesn't serve some sort of function... even if like a pot
hole in the highways of my mind that the little axions have long
since built around. Or did it disperse?* Little bits of cerebral
palsy or whatever causes it have spread throughout my brain,
affecting fundamentally how I think, feel, believe, consider
thoughts, conceive of new ideas? or was it more like a stuck
engine that needed an extra, "*PUSH* to get going? Impetus. Once
the engine is moving smoothly, there's no trace that it was ever
stuck in the first place. Ah well.* It's one of those 'things
I'll probably never know" but I hope someday to comprehend
better.
