clubfoot – Natalie Abbott

A Letter of Appreciation to Zappos

If you have weird feet, Zappos is perhaps the best solution ever. Shoe stores can be awkward:

“Do you have anything in size 5.5? No? What is the smallest size you have? 7? No, I won’t be trying that on since it’s… too big?”

“Fits this foot, but not this foot.” <slide shoes in box, slink away before employee returns and you have to explain.

So for someone with foot issues ( in my case, I have a clubfoot so one foot is smaller and wider than the other!) making finding shoes a chore, Zappos is awesome! I’m actually happy they haven’t marked my account as returning way too much… but being able to buy a few sizes and assess or just try on a shoe I liked but they didn’t have anything small enough is wonderful!

This is what a corner of my apartment looks like right now:

And I’m really happy with finding the pair of shoes that (finally) fit!

Disability & the Newbery

Review: The War that Saved My Life

Once again, a book featuring a protagonist with a disability received a Newbery Honor! This year I was especially excited both because I had reviewed the book for the Disability in Kidlit blog, and because it featured a girl with a clubfoot – one of my medical conditions!

Books were a powerful connection tool for me as a young girl with a bunch of medical stuff going on, in the pre-Internet, pre-support group world. I devoured anything remotely related to disability, hospitals, surgery, all that fun stuff. I’m so happy that these books are being written and getting traction from audiences and librarians. Need to find and read the other Schneider award winners now!

Semi-Wordless Wednesday: World Clubfoot Day

Today I woke up, and my feet hurt. They pretty much always ache, to some degree. I had an ever-so-helpful (not) orthopedist tell me about 10 years ago that the surgery used to correct my clubfoot was “outdated”… yeah, not much we can do about that now! Basically, instead of using casts to nudge my foot in the right direction they did something with my tendons… which left my foot and leg a bit screwed up.

For me, the constant ache and fatigue of my legs is one of the most debilitating parts of how Moebius syndrome affects me now and has the most impact on how I feel. It’s hard to be positive and enthusiastic about life when you’re in pain. It’s hard to work when it hurts to stand up, much less walk.

I pop a few Tylenol Alleve and suck it up, that’s the only thing I know how to do.

Clubfoot Treatment Changes Featured on NPR

This is a fascinating article and discussion about the advances in clubfoot treatment over the past few years. For me, having a clubfoot is difficult even though it was technically “fixed” before I was 2 – I have a lot of chronic pain and balance issues from that foot and leg. It’s great that different, more effective, approaches are being embraced – thanks in no small amount to the power of the internet to connect diverse people facing similar challenges.