My name is Sarah C., I’m 13 years old, and I have Scoliosis. Scoliosis is very common, mostly in girls. Scoliosis is not a disease, but rather it is a term used to describe any abnormal, sideways curvature of the spine. When the doctor found I had Scoliosis, I was 11 years old. I had a 10 degree curve, so it wasn’t so bad. The doctors monitored my spine for over a year, sending me to get x-rays and looking at my spine standing up. I was frightened, I used to think that it would just get to a certain degree and then SNAP! It doesn’t work out that way, though.

The March after I turned 12 doctors sent me to get x-rays done once again. My curve had progressed very much. I used to have a 10 degree curve, but what they found was now a 23 degree curve. When you have Scoliosis, you are assigned to wear a brace for 16 hours a day once your curve reaches a certain point. That point is 25 degrees. For me, they decided that it would be best to give me a brace when I had my 23 degree curve.

About a week passed and I went to a fitting for my brace. I went to a hospital located in Philadelphia where I met Mr. Cocco. He doesn’t like being called a “doctor.” He makes casts, braces, prosthetics and other things I can’t recall. He’s a very nice man. When I got to the hospital room he greeted me with a smile and asked me to take a seat. We talked about the brace and Scoliosis, I was very optimistic. He said it was good that I was staying positive, that most girls are hysterical, saying they don’t want to wear a brace.

When the fitting came I had to wear a strange cloth over my body so that the cast they put on me wouldn’t stick to my skin. It’s hard to explain, but that’s what they did. They wrapped a cast tightly around me, then cut it off so they had a mold of my body so they could have my brace custom-made.

2 weeks later I went back to Philadelphia. It was on the first Monday of spring break. My brace was made of plastic and had three Velcro straps on it. The thing looked like a brutal torture device. Mr. Cocco showed me how to put it on. He put it on me about a million times, every time making adjustments, cutting off hunks of plastic, putting it back on again, looking, asking for my opinions, all to make sure that I was comfortable.

Once the brace was fitted, I went to get x-rays again, and after a little bit of chatter, I was on my way home with my brace strapped onto my body. Cocco said that during the first week I would need to get used to it. He said that I might say things like “I can’t breath!” or “I can’t move!” I did say those things, what a genius he was.

I thought the brace would be easy to wear. Sixteen hours is a long time, and I had to wear that thing for 16 hours a day for a year.

How could I do this? It seemed impossible. The brace was so hard to wear, so hard to dress. Almost everything I wore had to be a crewneck, and I felt like my shirt was always chocking me.

The first day I went to school with my brace I wore a shirt with some emo band on it. I was talking to a girl named Gabi, and when I brought up my brace she said “what brace?” and I proceeded to pull up my shirt and say “this brace!” That was awkward. I then tapped on my brace to show that it was very hard.

I didn’t take off my brace for gym, and ended up just not running or doing sit-ups, I don’t think the workouts were that much easier, though, but the mile was!

People liked punching the brace, as well. I couldn’t really feel the punches, well at least not in a painful way. I was fine with people finding humor in my brace as long as they weren’t making fun of it, it’s better to look on the bright side, anyway.

Suddenly people started saying that I only wore my brace for attention, that I didn’t really need it. That really hurt, at least until I realized how stupid the statement was. Why would I put myself through so much torture just so that a few irrelevant people in my life would take notice of me? No thanks! Besides, they were probably jealous because I didn’t have to run in gym class, they don’t know how lucky they are.

In gym I did start getting bullied a bit for my brace, and then when I told my guidance counselor this, she said it was all in my head. That I was overreacting. I know what sarcasm is when I hear it, I’m the queen of being sarcastic.

It has been around 6 months since I started wearing my brace. I still have 6 months to go. In march, when I get my brace off, I will not miss it. Not one bit. But if you have Scoliosis and you may need a brace its not that bad. It’s pretty annoying but not that bad. Yet, if you do get a brace, I beg of you, please wear it. Don’t stop wearing it just because it’s uncomfortable, fight through it, because if you get to that 40 degree curve and you need surgery, it’s like wearing a brace for the rest of your life. Trust me, the Scoliosis life isn’t all that bad.