Why I Trashed all of my Leg Braces

Memories of Walking on Marbles – Gone.

 In 2007 when I was diagnosed with MS, my major symptom was drop foot.  I also had a herniated disc that was removed before I was diagnosed because they missed the MS that was the culprit if my faulty gait pattern that led to the disc problem in the first place.  But it happens to many who are misdiagnosed or who just suffer for years without ever knowing.  I am blessed to have had doctors and health professionals over the years who did the best they could to help keep me up in my feet.

But there is only so much you can do with a leg brace. I hate to say that because there are so many people who need it, but it wasn’t the only thing that I could’ve been doing. I had a walkaide since I found out about it shortly after getting a new AFO.

The Walkaide was my best option to keep my lower leg active and not tripping over my foot. When my leg was in a brace, my muscles didn’t do the work and I just rely to put my brace to hold my leg and my foot. I thought this was the next step after my knee kept hyperextending.  The leg brace was always something that I could rely on so I kept pushing into it harder and never thinking to not do that because when I didn’t have a brace any more my knee would just hyperextend.

So there’s a lot of history for me with leg braces, and when I had my ankle surgery in August, I was glad to be done with them and to put back on my walkaide.

It is particularly difficult when you want your young son to sit on your lap, but the leg brace hurts for him to sit on. And it wasn’t exactly easy for me to get it on and off because it was always in my shoe.

I kept my leg braces in my closet, and the pile grew.  When I was in my room organizing Furay, and rearranging shelves in the closet, these braces would get thrown in and out of my closet over a three day period. I finally had enough and just decided that I needed to minimize. For good. I decided to move on in my journey, and put these braces to bed.

I took pictures of them for memory put them in a garbage bag, actually a couple of them, and threw them out in the trash for pick up today.

I went to the gym, came back two hours later and they were gone forever. Bye-bye leg braces. Thank you for your help over the years, before I had my surgery. I’m ready to move on now to the next leg of my journey.