My fortune today, I laughed when I saw it. ❤️
Today we got to take part in a class for medical students studying anatomy. Today’s topic was bone growth and bone abnormalities. That’s where I come in.
Amy’s Daddy and I had the opportunity to present Amy’s case, from birth to yesterday’s post-op. We spoke on NF1 a little, but mainly CPT for about 45 minutes. It was an absolutely amazing experience. It was also kinda funny, because we were obviously not what they were expecting.
On a whim, I tossed together a no-big-deal power point with pictures of Amy and a few of her x-rays. I added a sentence or two on each page, and called it Christmas.
When we arrived at the university, I spoke with the professor, and he was super surprised I had a PowerPoint for my presentation. He glanced at it and suggested that I tell her story, and then flip through the presentation since it would only take “a minute or two.” I assured him that it would take 10 to 15 minutes to go through my slides- and he agreed to let me have my way, when I promised to not just stand up there and read.
I ended up presenting a little longer than I thought as I was interrupted a couple times with questions- and it was a hell of an ego stroke to hear them laugh at my jokes. Questions were rapid-fired at us, and Lauren and I took them mostly in turns. They ranged from symptoms, to pain control, to family history, to treatment options… we ran up right to the end of the class, and got a big round of applause.
It was absolutely amazing, and the professor was very pleased. He told us he’d like us to return. “No pressure!” Dude, he paid for our parking, our mileage, and gave us about $150 in gift cards. Hell yes we want to come back! We’d do it for free.
But the biggest bonus was that some of the kids were truly impassioned, seemly trying to figure out the disease. Who knows? Maybe one of them will discover a breakthrough that could help my little girl, or others like her. ❤️❤️❤️
