Born This Way

   I've had some free time at work this week and I have been thinking about what having Turner Syndrome has really meant for my life. It has had a great impact on my life, but it has done nothing to hold me back from accomplishing my dreams and goals in life, and I hope that some of the stories I share in this post will help you realize that you are a girl with TS, but you are also so much more than that.

      When I was in high school, my Freshman year, I was 4 feet 6 inches tall and barely 90 pounds, but I was determined to play tennis for my high school. My high school at that point didn't have a girls tennis team, so I had to try out for the guys team along with one other girl. We both made the team and ended up in the top 6 people on the team who played matches each week. Me and the other girl also played doubles together and we won every single match that we played together. Despite being short and having to run a little more than a lot of people did, my height did nothing to stop me from playing tennis for my school. In fact, a girls tennis team was built around me and the other girl who played on the guys team with me my freshman and sophomore years. I also played soccer for my high school and was a starting midfielder my junior and senior years. My height made it a little harder for me to catch people who had the ball to try to take it from them, but I could kick the ball as hard, if not harder than anyone else, and I even managed to knock a few people down trying to get the ball. So I guess the moral of these two stories is that being short has honestly not affected me athletically, in fact I think it may have even made me work harder at my athletic goals to prove to myself and others that I could do it.

     I was a social butterfly up until I got my diagnosis of TS. I had plans almost every weekend and was on the phone with my friends every night sharing gossip or news that had happened at school that day (after homework of course)-I was your typical teenage girl. When I got my diagnosis, I was worried that people could look at me and realize that there was something different about me, which they couldn't do. I had a reverse metamorphosis, instead of the social butterfly that I was, I became very shy, I went back into my coccoon to continue the metaphor. It took a while for me to realize that people couldn't look at me and realize that I was different and that helped a lot with my shyness. It is still a daily battle for me to not go into my coccoon and I struggle with it some days, but I have gotten myself to the point that I am shy once I first meet someone but then I open up once I get to know them and I become the social butterfly that I once was. 

     So, if you, like I did, are struggling with your diagnosis of TS, just remember that you are a perfectly normal girl, who deserves to take every chance that life gives her. And in the words of a Lady GaGa song, you were born this way, so be proud of who you are and let your light shine. Be a girl who has Turners but not a girl who lets Turners keep her from living a normal life.