I am now a middle school sophomore. When I was little, when I walked down the street with my mom, I often heard kids say, "Why is that lady so short?" and adults often treated my mom like a child. I didn't pay much attention to it back then because I was young, but as I grew up, I thought my mom must be really short. At home, I was short so my mom looked tall, and my mom wore high heels outside, so I didn't feel she was that short.

As I grew up, I grew taller than my mom, and when I compared her to many people, I realized my mom was short. I stood in the front when I was asked to stand in order of height at school, but I didn't find it particularly uncomfortable. Height order wasn't that important in elementary school, and there wasn't much difference between me and the other kids. Rather, I hung out a lot with the kids who were at the back in terms of height. So, I didn't feel any discomfort about my height.

At that time, I didn't know what genes were or what heredity was, so I didn't think that I could be as short as my mom. During the winter vacation of 5th grade, my mom went to see Professor Song Hae-ryong. At that time, I didn't know what was going on, but I just followed her and got diagnosed. Even after hearing from Professor Song Hae-ryong that I could only grow to 142cm, I didn't care. I thought, "I'm fine living now, so do I really have to do it?"

But even though I couldn't fully understand the pain my mom went through because she was short, I still thought, "It's not good to be short!" At that time, the professor said, "You only need to wear the ring for 6 months," so I thought it would be easy and decided to have the surgery.

At that time, I had never had surgery before, so I just thought it would be nice because my mom would do everything I asked her to do if I was hospitalized. And what I was most happy about was getting a cell phone. After I bought the cell phone I wanted so much, all thoughts of "How much will it hurt after the surgery?" disappeared, and I was just happy to buy what I wanted. And I immediately bragged to my friends that I bought a cell phone.

That day, my mom told me not to go to school from tomorrow. I couldn't go because I was being admitted on Saturday. I didn't want to miss school, so I insisted on going to school tomorrow and being admitted after school. And the next day, when I went to school, my friends decorated a lot of gift notebooks and wrote letters to me individually. But I didn't prepare anything, so I felt sorry and grateful. I didn't want to be separated from my friends, but I thought something fun would happen if I was hospitalized.

After completing all the admission procedures at the hospital, I went to the hospital. I wished I had a private room, but it was a 6-bed room. I went up to the room, and even though it wasn't my first time, it felt awkward and I realized that the surroundings had changed a lot. I looked around the room and there were only grandmothers, and I felt like the grandmothers would be picky, and the caregivers were all middle-aged women, so I didn't like it. I wanted to go home that day.

I got an X-ray at night, and went to the sports medicine room to take various photos and videos, and I wondered why I had to take these. I was going to go back to my room at night, but even though it was only 10 o'clock, there was no one in the hallway except for the doctors and nurses. And when I went into the room, all the lights were off, so it was uncomfortable because I couldn't watch TV. It's time for me to be on the computer and watching TV at home now, but I was bored and had nothing to do, so I couldn't fall asleep, and eventually I asked my mom to go out and came back at 12 o'clock.

The next day, two days before the surgery, I wasn't even thinking about it. That time of getting an IV was bigger than my fear of the surgery. Because I always have invisible blood vessels, so it's basic to get poked several times, so I didn't want to get it. The nurse brought the IV and poked the needle, tied my arm with a rubber band, and it still didn't work, so she hit it a few times and it still didn't work, so she moved to the other arm and stuck it in, and it still didn't work, so she repeated the poking.

Only then does blood come out. What should I say when I see blood? 'Should I be happy?' Anyway, I was happy that I didn't have to do it anymore. And I had nothing to do at the hospital, but my mom was busy. The grandmothers were watching TV, so they only watched morning shows like "Morning Yard," so it wasn't fun. Then, a Namchon Dream Class teacher who does music therapy and art therapy told me that there were many fun programs and recommended me to get a computer program, and it was fun.

The day before the surgery

That was the most painful time for me. Because that's when I started fasting. And that day, I saw a person who had surgery for the first time. They had something like a ring on, so it was gross and scary. Now I'm going to wear that! That's when I first started to hate and fear surgery. But I didn't tell my mom.

On the day of the surgery, I was able to safely complete the surgery and return to my room. The day after the anesthesia wore off and I came to my senses, I was surprised to see my legs. My thighs were twice as big, and when I touched them, there was something like metal. It was also difficult to urinate alone. But my legs were a little sore, and other than the fact that I couldn't walk yet, I didn't feel much different than before the surgery.

When I rode in a wheelchair for the first time, there were many difficulties, but thanks to the caregiver, I was able to ride easily. It was my first time riding in a wheelchair, so I wasn't good at driving.

My mom who had a hard time controlling her anger and making me exercise with kind words

When I disinfected it for the first time, it was so painful that I cried, and my mom who was next to me cried too. I went to the sports medicine room to exercise. There, I did exercises to bend my knees or stretch my ankles and ligaments. It didn't hurt, but I was surprised when blood came out of the pin when I stood there. I went to the sports medicine room once a day to exercise, and I had to come up to the room and do other exercises little by little, but I neglected it, and later it became a problem and blood came out of my legs. I realized that consistent exercise is important.

Sometimes my friends said they would come to visit me, but I lied that I had been discharged because I didn't want to show them this side of me. After being discharged, I only moved when I had to poop at home, and I hardly exercised, so I got a lot of nagging from my mom. A welfare center said they would help me exercise, so I went there twice a week to exercise. But on rainy days, it was hard to go out, so I couldn't go.

Then I got a call from school. They said that if I didn't go to school in 6th grade, I would be held back. I went to school in a wheelchair for now, but it was hard to move because the classroom was on the 3rd floor. So I attended Rainbow School, which I could do at home, and got credit for attendance.

Tip-toe surgery

I really hated exercising. But the result was terrible. Because I became tip-toed because I didn't exercise. Usually, tip-toe surgery is essential if you increase by more than 10cm, but I felt so unfair that I became tip-toed even though I didn't increase by 10cm. But I thought it was fortunate that I had less fear of surgery.

After the surgery, my mom suffered more than I did. I feel sorry for my whole family because I couldn't do much housework because I was taking care of me.

I had tip-toe surgery and exercised hard. When I was able to wear a cast and walk with crutches, my mom, who couldn't afford the taxi fare, told me to take the bus. But I hated the way people looked at me, but I endured it and rode the bus, thinking that I had to exercise hard.

Problems are bound to arise if you neglect exercise because your body is tired or you are lazy. If you get through this period, you can walk and run like other kids.

Cheer up!