Childhood

Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When as yet there were none of them. (Psalm 139:16)

I often think about how my tears could be more useful in this world where water is such a precious resource.
Tears gathered all these years would be more than sufficient to do something......
When I was a baby, surely I must have cried a lot since I was diagnosed as having Osteogenesis Imperfecta (brittle bones) when my bones broke during birth and subsequently never-ending until I was 19 years old.
From then on till now, I have led a miraculous life of no more fracture even though I still had falls few years back.
I only suffered sprains and pain.
I know of a baby who had the same condition and the number of fractures that she had was more than her age in months.
And she's only 2+ years old.
Imagine my horror and heartbreak at seeing myself at her age, wrapped in casts for 4 limbs when all bones break, one after another.
I don't recall anything before 7 years old and the reason how I started to remember was because I had my first surgery at 7 years old after I slipped and fell after running.
Can't believe that I could actually run then. 
My first metal rod in my femur.
After that, countless surgeries, many exchanges of rods and metal plates in both femurs over 12 years.
I'm very fortunate, only the femur bones broke.
Some people with this condition died after birth, have fractures in many parts of the body...
At 7 years old, I started my life in Singapore General Hospital for acute care, then St Andrew's Hospital for rehabilitative care, then I fell down again, needed acute care then rehabilitative care and the cycle continued till I was 12 years old.
Falling down and learning to walk again; the whole process took 6 months.
The pain was physical, mental and emotional.
I feared falling down.
I was a fragile doll, that's what medical personnel said.
My cast was always from the waist to the toes (since it's the femur) and I could not sit up straight.
I had my P1 to P5 education by teachers who came to the hospital to teach us.
I would lie down and write on a standing board put on my bed.
Each time I tell my students how I studied when I was their age, they would think it's so unbelievable.
But it was very normal to me.
Perhaps I didn't know the better way outside.
At the end of P5, the hospital was reconstructed and I had to be discharged.
Had my first taste of how it was like studying in a mainstream school: Pearl's Hill School.
Was on a wheelchair.
Poor mum had to push me up and down the steep slope everyday.
She also came during recess.
Don't know how I managed to do well for PSLE since it was my only year in formal education.
It was truly the grace of God though the name 'Jesus' was just a name associated with presents during Christmas.
I heard His name at 7 years old.
He wrote my story before I was born.
I have a book.
You too.
Do you know the Author?