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it through the doors in one piece (two, counting the prosthesis).
    Victory came at a price. The prosthesis was a step up, but it was functionally flawed. My skin graft at the bottom of my leg was thin, and right on top of the bone. No matter what padding I used—like superthick socks—or how much extra space was built into the lowerpart of the prosthesis, my skin graft chafed with each step. The first hour in the prosthesis, my graft was abraded raw. In two hours, it was bleeding and open. Often, bone was exposed. But I didn’t tell anyone.
    My parents asked me a thousand times, “How does the leg feel? Is it comfortable?”
    I always said, “Yes!”
    Nothing was going to stop me from wearing it. I kept the abrasions a secret for as long as I could, but Mom kept too close a watch. She discovered the problem, and immediately called the prosthetist and my doctors. They tripped a new alarm, which was the last thing either Mom or I needed. Apparently, an open wound by the bone could lead to an infection called osteomyelitis. Unchecked, it could spread rapidly through my entire skeletal system and kill me.
    Our reactions to this news were only too predictable.
    Mom pretended to be strong, but crumbled in private.
    Dad was furious my graft and prosthesis weren’t perfect considering what we had all gone through.
    I didn’t give a shit about the abrasions or osteomyelitis or even the constant pain of walking. Like every other mono- or biped seven-year-old, I cared about vanilla chocolate-chip Häagen-Dazs ice cream, candy, pizza, Disney World, the pictures on my T-shirts, Clever the dog, my stuffed animal collection, Shel Silverstein’s Where the Sidewalk Ends, and Star Wars . I cared about getting the good mat at rest time and the fattest paintbrush in art class. The doctors’ warnings were immaterial to me. Scrapes and pain were not going to get in my way. I would have dragged around a leg of solid steel if it brought me a few inches closer to normal.
    Mom began her fanatical stump cleaning and disinfecting routine. My prosthesis was refit again and again. The manufacturers tried to use more of a cushion; they designed a larger gap between the stumpand the padding; they experimented with reinforcing my knee support. But nothing worked. The abrasions and pain were a part of my daily existence for two decades.
    The wounds hurt, but I refused to go to the nurse’s office or call home from school. I would just walk through the pain. I would run through it. Often, I limped. Whenever I was with children or adults who did not know about the leg, they would ask, “Why are you limping?” The question was innocent, but I would boil inside nonetheless. If someone noticed, it meant I was failing at being normal. I would coolly answer, “I wear a knee brace.” There was no way that I was going to explain my whole, heavy story to a stranger.
    Pain was the price I had to pay to participate in life. I didn’t know why I had to pay it, but I knew I had to. I always marched through it. I would wave at the elevator lady, and then trudge up the stairs. Some days the pain got the better of me by the end of the day. I would get grumpy and often I took it out on my mom.
    When I came home from school, I unstrapped the prosthesis and gasped with relief. Mom would come into my room to check the abrasions. If they were particularly bad, she’d excuse herself to go cry in another room. Her game face was starting to falter. Sometimes, if the abrasions were really gross and bloody, she’d dash to the bathroom and vomit. In hindsight, I know now that her secret drinking played a big part in her nausea. But at seven, I had no idea what was really going on with her.
    Slowly, surely, my life started to look like a normal second grader’s. Obviously, I couldn’t do everything . But I was able to dance (very important in 1977 when disco was king), roller-skate, and play tag at gym. I lost a lot at running bases. I was glad to lose! It meant I