For the Love of Forceps
Let’s start at the beginning: May 21, 1979 at 12:03 AM, I was born screaming and crying into this world. Weighing in at over 10 lbs, I was too big to slide gracefully from the birth canal so the doctors yanked me free with forceps (which explains the screaming and crying). My mom tells me it’s a miracle I survived – I was blue from a lack of oxygen. They’d had to act quickly with those forceps, and in all the haste and excitement it seems they forgot I was a delicate baby. The force used to extract me broke my left arm and ripped the nerves in my neck responsible for rotation and movement of my right arm. This type of injury is common enough to have its own name – Erb’s Palsy.
What does it mean? It means that I can’t turn my arm over, palm up; that one arm is about 1 ½ inches shorter than the other; that I can’t do pull-ups; that I attract stares when bowling, writing on a chalkboard, giving a high-five, drinking a soda or accepting change when carrying groceries in my left hand. It means that even though I’m right-handed, I’ve learned to do almost everything (save for writing) with my left hand. This includes putting on makeup, shaving and eating. And to tell you the truth, I wouldn’t know the difference except that I take exceptionally long showers (ever try shaving with your non-dominant hand?) and spend forever getting ready to go out. It’s either the Erb’s or being female – take your pick.
And every once in a while, a stranger has reminded me I have Erb’s Palsy. The girl at the lunch table who said I eat like a Barbie. The UPS guy who asked, “What’s wrong with your arm?” The cashier at the coffeehouse who asked if I was a dancer. When I explain that it’s partially paralyzed from a difficult birth, the response is almost always, “Oh, I thought you were just graceful.” Apparently the stiffness in my arm makes me look “proper” and “stuck-up,” or so I’m told. I guess there are worse things a girl could be – brain damaged, wheelchair bound or even dead.
And once, while waiting tables, a large family asked about my arm. Their granddaughter had just been born with Erb’s Palsy and they were worried for her future. How would she grow? Would she be ‘normal’? Seeing me, the relief on their faces was unmistakable. Yes, Folks, for all intensive purposes – I am normal.
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Thanks for reading, nice to meet you - I wish it were under different circumstances
