To cure vs. To treat.
• To cure is to complete the restoration (get rid of) of health.
• To treat is IMPROVE health, but may not include the complete elimination of a disease.
What’s coming up for achondroplasia isn’t a cure nor is it genocide. It’s hope.
Parents and caregivers are making the decision to TREAT their child’s diagnosis with achondroplasia as they don’t want their child to suffer from many, many of the life-threatening complications that can occur from having this condition.
To those who don’t feel that it is suffering living with this condition, then why seek the many, many medical interventions (in other words, treatments) for decompression, spinal fusion, ear tubes, the list just goes on and on (as you know)…You say, not to mess with God’s creation or not to change what Mother Nature intended and if that’s the case, then why not let nature just run its course?
Sounds ridiculous, right? Because you want to TREAT what you suffer from? You may not suffer from your height, but you do suffer from achondroplasia.
I try so hard to be open and understanding of both sides, but when parents and caregivers (who are already scared shitless about this diagnosis) are made to feel like crap for choosing what they feel in their gut is the best decision for their child’s health, you’re not advocating. You’re criticizing.
The nature of the world I live in has always surrounded me with nurture, never criticism for my diagnosis. But those that I share this diagnosis with, have made me (and I know many others) feel more criticized, less than, and small (no pun intended, I swear) for how I (we) choose to treat achondroplasia.
Understand that these therapies aren’t a chemical limb lengthening. They’re so much more…So thank God, Mother Nature, AND science for that.
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