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Basketball Brace

It started 6 weeks ago with my basketball coach sending me to the school nurse to have she check my back after he had noticed that my posture had increasingly gotten worse over the last 2 months. I kept telling him that it was just the way I stood and could straighten up when I wanted too. Of curse that was a complete lie and my back was hurting me so bad that I could not sleep well at night.

The school nurse asked me to take off my shirt and stand straight. I stood as straight as I could but not enough for her and she spoke sharply that I should hold my shoulders back and quit slouching. I replied rather shortly that I was standing as straight as I could. After bending and twisting at her command she told me that I could put my shirt back on and that she would give a report to my coach and give my parents a call. She then dismissed me without further explanation.

After I got home that afternoon, Mom met me at the door and told me the school nurse had called and set up an appointment for me late that afternoon with a local orthopedic specialist.

Mom let me change clothes before we left for the appointment. On the drive over I started getting nervous with the speed with which everything was moving and asked Mom what the big rush was about. She explained that the school nurse suspected that my lasted growth spurt was causing problems with my spine and thought that it would be best to get a professional’s opinion.

So after a series of examinations, x-rays, and tests the orthopedic specialist sat down with my Mom and I an explained that I had a rare condition that was causing my bones to grow at an excessive rate. The bone growth rate was faster than my muscular development which was causing my spine to curve at an alarming rate and also causing hip deformities. I had two choices according to the Dr. which was to undergo surgery or try brace treatment to support my spine while I finished growing. I wanted to have the surgery an get on with my life, but not mother! She made the choice to have me wear the brace. The problem with the brace option was the Dr. told us that I might possibly be in the brace for 5-8 years. I was already 17. I could not accept that I might be wearing a brace all though college and what about basketball! My condition was further complicated with the fact that others with my disorder did not reach skeletal maturity until they’re mid 20’s.

From there I went to an orthoist where I made a huge mistake. I shot off my mouth that I would not wear the brace except at night and that nothing could make me wear it 23 hours a day. Well the orthoist just smiled and said that he could help with that problem. So after a couple of hours in a plaster cast from my chin to my knees, I finally had a few weeks to sort through my feeling of the last few days.

One thing I was sure of was that I would not quit basketball and I was not wearing any brace to school. So with those convictions, I forgot about the brace and went through the next several weeks as if nothing had happened.

Finally, one afternoon Mom told me that we were going to be fitted for my brace the next morning and that I should pack some extra clothing that was loose and baggy an be prepared to spend the next day at the orthoist shop.

Since I did not believe that I would be wearing the brace home, I did not pack any extra clothing and went to bed thinking I would be at basketball practice the next afternoon and that I needed to work on my free throws.

Morning came and Mom told me to eat a good breakfast put my extra clothes in the car and be ready to leave at 8:30.

We signed in at 9 and sat down to wait for them to call us back to a fitting room.

Shortly a young women called my name an asked us to follow her back to another room with a workbench and tools hanging all over the wall. There was something lying on the workbench under a sheet. The young women seemed nervous and then explained that this was a modified brace design and that she was anxious to see how it assembled.

Needless to say that only made me more nervous. Mom put her arm around me and told me that she would wait outside if I needed her.

A few minutes later a very cute young man walked in an introduced himself and explained that he would be fitting my brace today. He asked me to take my clothes off including my underwear. After an embarrassing look, he explained that he could turn the heat up in the room if I was cold, but that I was to be naked for the fitting.

He left the room for me to undress and get some additional parts for the brace.

Now as I said earlier, I had grown a lot in the last few months and I was very self-conscious about my body. When he walked back in I was holding my shirt to my breasts and glowing red. He smiled and told me to relax, that by this afternoon I would be over my embarrassment.

He pulled the sheet from the workbench and uncovered a pile of metal, plastic, leather, and foam padding. He explained that my brace would be fitted to me in pieces to ensure a perfect fit. He then explained that my brace was an extensively modified Milwaukee for kyphosis. Since I was just over 6 feet tall and still growing a normal Milwaukee would not give me the needed strength and support I required.

First he removed a large plastic thing from the workbench and pulled it apart and asked me to step into it. As the plastic closed around me I felt my body straighten a little as the plastic enveloped me. Then I heard Velcro as tighten it around my body. I was encased from my hips to my armpits. He then told me that he would be trimming the plastic to fit. What a relief since my breasts were covered and I could not bend at the waist. With a black marker, he started tracing lines in the brace that he would later cut out.

After several fittings and trimmings, I was left with a plastic girdle that covered my butt to my tailbone and dipped very low down to my privates in front. The part in front of my legs had been cut out to allow me to bend my legs some. The waist was very tight and came up on my lower back a little way, but the front came up to just under my breasts and was very tight in the stomach area pushing my stomach in and forcing me to stand up straighter with my hips rolled forward and lower back flattened out. My back still hunched forward some and forced the pelvic girdle into my breasts. I asked about that and he said that he would take care of that shortly. The pelvic girdle had three Velcro straps in back. Next he marked the pelvic girdle in back and attached two metal bars to it. He made some marks on them while I had it on and then removed them to make adjustments. Next he took another metal bar and held it to my chest and made some measurements before making some adjustments.

He then had me put the pelvic girdle back on and attached the back bars. There where two thick pads that pushed me forward in the front of the girdle that hurt quite a bit. He said to hold on while he put the front bar on the brace. This part was a little scary since it was between my breasts and had a pad at the top that he kept bumping my chin with. He took some more measurements and then took it off for assemble. While I watched him work I began to see it take shape and asked why he was adding the metal ring at the top of the metal bars. He told me it was to keep the brace centered over my hips and hold the metal bars together to do their work. After he had finished putting it together he turned asked me to stand and step into it as he pulled it open. This I did, but felt immediately trapped as it closed around me. For the first time I understood how the brace would straighten me out. My spine felt as if it were being stretched and pulled apart.

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