Dwarf: A Memoir (18 page)

He was just my best friend, calling to hear about my accomplishment of the day.

You’re Gonna Be the One That Saves Me

Mike in the limo at my sweet sixteen birthday celebration.

T
HE DAILY ROUTINE
I dreaded most during the bone-lengthening process was pin care. Not even the constant
physical therapy was worse, because once I was pumped up to stretch or do range-of-motion
routines, my blood scorched through my veins and empowered me to work.

Nothing pumped me up for pin care. With more than a dozen pins protruding from my
legs, I had to clean them— every single one of them— twice a day.

It not only hurt, it was messy and irritating and tediously repetitive. The process
took about forty-five minutes each time.
First there was the task of gathering supplies from the linen closet: a blue absorbent
pad, sterile saline, a plastic presealed cup, quarter-sized octagon-shaped sponges,
sterile cotton swabs that looked like giant Q-tips, and hydrogen peroxide. Then there
was the prep work.

First I filled a cup with saline. Next my mom lifted my legs and placed the pad underneath
them to catch the liquid that would inevitably roll off, and the big Q-tips went into
the cup. Then we had to remove all of the little octagon-shaped sponges that were
anchored around each pin from the night before. It was painstaking. Worse yet, some
of the sponges dried to the pin sites, like clingy stubborn little squeegees, wrapped
around the pins. There was no choice but to rip them away. Pin care was a necessary
evil. There was just no way around it. Eventually, I found a way around some of the
sticky scenarios. Ever a control freak and insistent on doing things myself, I poured
hydrogen peroxide over each pin and let the mini sponges absorb it until they were
too soaked to stick. The cold peroxide made my thigh muscles rise up and flex around
the pins— which was almost as painful as a muscle spasm. This was only the beginning.
Each pin took four Q-tips. I dipped each swab into the saline and wiped away any scabs,
making sure also to push my skin gently down and away from the pin. Twice a day I
was a living, breathing, barely walking maintenance machine. And I bitched and moaned,
winced and clenched my teeth the whole time.

Coping with pain in my house meant one of two things. If you could fix it, you did
so and moved on. If you refused to fix it, you were on your own. “Suffer, then!” Mom
would say— the choices were to suffer or fix it. Given those two options, I did my
best to “get a straw,” as Mom was so fond of saying, and suck it up.

While going through the tedious motions one day, a TV ad
for a car— a BMW Z3— caught my gaze and wouldn’t let go. The car was beautiful, sexy,
and intriguing. The driver looked carefree and limitless. It was the greatest thing
I’d ever seen on television. Everything about that vehicle exemplified independence
and I desperately wanted it.

“DiDonato. Tiffanie DiDonato,” Dad teased in his best James Bond impression. “The
ultimate driving machine,” he said, smiling. A car fanatic with a ’66 GTO and a Corvette
of his own, Dad found it particularly amusing that his daughter, who never expressed
an interest in automobiles, had somehow managed to eye one of the most expensive ones
out there. I think it made him proud.

What’s more, that little roadster opened a whole new realm of motivation for me. It
blew me away. As I turned my pins, I visualized myself driving it. Day after day,
I became one millimeter closer to reaching its pedals. I wanted more motivation to
keep pushing through my rehabilitation. I requested free catalogs from clothing retailers
like Girlfriends and dELiA
^*
s. My parents even allowed me to order a few outfits. I hung them on the bathroom
door or in our dining room entranceway. While I continued to struggle with walking
to the bathroom and the sensation of my skin rolling up and down the wires, I pushed
the feeling away by imagining what the material would feel like on legs longer than
the ones I currently had. That November, I was approaching my first full one-inch
mark— and my sixteenth birthday. Suddenly, the same clothes that compelled me to work
hard became visual reminders of what I couldn’t wear.

My body wasn’t capable of celebrating much of anything yet. But Mike disagreed. Over
the course of several phone calls he began his campaign to sell me on a sweet sixteen
celebration.

At first, Mike was subtle and cute in his efforts.

He would call me and play Oasis’s “Wonderwall” on his guitar. I
always closed my eyes during the line, “’Cause maybe . . . you’re gonna be the one
that saves me,” thinking about how much comfort Mike brought me by just being there.
Then the birthday badgering began. “What do you have planned next week?” he’d asked
casually.

“Nothing.”

“I think it’s someone’s birthday next week, too, but I forget who . . .”

“Oh? Sounds like a problem you have there.” I played right into his little game, just
as I always did.

“If it was your birthday next week, what would you want to do for it?”

“If it was
my
birthday,
I
would do nothing.”

“Nothing?” I could tell he was gearing up to jump down my throat. “Tiff, you can’t
not
celebrate your sixteenth birthday!”

“I thought you forgot whose birthday it was,” I said with the slightest giggle, holding
the phone close to me.

“And I thought you’d want to do something cool.”

I glanced at the Girlfriends catalog on my hospital table and felt a pang of envy
over the teenage model looking so carefree and happy in her brand-new outfit. She
was ready to party. I was not.

“Well, my ball gown is still at the cleaner’s. So naturally that puts a damper on
my exciting plans,” I joked.

“Do you always have to be a wiseass?”

“It’s better than being a dumb-ass.”

“Tiff, seriously.”

“Mike”— I matched his serious tone— “I
am
serious. Last week I pissed my pants, my appetite isn’t fully back yet, and I’m stuck
in plus-size men’s boxers instead of pants.”

“Excuses, excuses,” he scolded. “You can’t just sit in that chair for your birthday.”

As the week passed, Mike started to get more aggressive with his approach over the
phone.

“Decide what you want to do for your birthday?” he asked.

“I want to relax,” I insisted.

“Why?”

“How am I going to do anything else?”

“Who cares how you do it, just do something that doesn’t involve the recliner.”

“I don’t want to. I’ll be happy staying home.”

“Your mom wants to go to dinner, I bet.”

“I’m sure she does.”

He paused before speaking again, this time as if he’d uncovered a hidden secret.

“Oh, I get it. You’re afraid to leave the house.”

“What?”

“I don’t believe it. Tiffanie DiDonato is a chicken shit.”

“I am not!”

“And you’re selfish. Your parents probably want to take you out, and you’re saying
no.”

“Shut up. You’re being mean.”

“Nope. I’m being honest. And I’m right.
I’m
right!
” He was practically screaming.

“No, you really aren’t.”

“You won’t leave the house because you’re afraid! You don’t want people to see you!
You think you’re hideous!”

“Mike, stop!”

“Stop being a scared little bitch!” Subtlety, with Mike, often found itself leaping
out the nearest window.

“Stop yelling at me!”

“Accept yourself!”

Then there was silence.

“You’re going to let the fear of other people prevent you from doing shit. This is
what started the whole surgery idea in the first place,” Mike began again.

“You have it backwards.”

“I thought this procedure was supposed to help you.”

“It is!”

“It’s keeping you in the house.”

“I have metal pins and nails in me, Michael!” I was angry now, raising my voice in
a way I never had with him before. “I can’t even lift up my legs!”

“So?”

“Mike, what the hell do you want me to do?” My eyes watered with frustration.

“Prove this surgery is working.”

“It’s not complete yet! How am I supposed to do that?”

“Prove you’re happy with your decision.”

“I
am
happy! Can’t you tell in my voice?
I’m fucking happy!
” I attempted to muster a pleasant tone. But Mike knew just what buttons to push to
get me fired up.

“Then go out to dinner,” he said calmly.

“How will that prove anything?”

“Go out to dinner,” he insisted.

“Mike, listen to me,” I argued.

“Go out to dinner.” He wouldn’t budge. Anything I tried to say was met with the same
line: “Go out to dinner.”

“Fine!”

“Great. Love you!” he said as sweet as could be, as if no argument had happened at
all. He said it sweetly because he won.

“Love you, too, damn it.” Part of me wanted him to win.

The next few times Mike called, he asked to speak directly to my mom. It wasn’t too
suspicious, because he often liked to make
small talk with my parents. Unconcerned, I passed the phone to my mom, but I did squeeze
in one question.

“Are you coming to dinner with us?”

“No. Celebrate with your mom and dad. I’ll come over after.”

“Fine. Be that way.”

And that was that. Despite our yelling and name-calling, Mike knew me pretty well.
Underneath my tough exterior, I really was afraid of people seeing my pins. Yes, I
had made the choice to undergo the procedure to help change not only the way people
saw me, but also the way I saw myself. But what if I scared children? What if I went
out to celebrate my birthday, and I permanently damaged a child’s innocence with the
sight of these things? They were pretty disgusting, after all. Even I had a hard time
looking at them. If I was a child and I saw pins drilled through someone’s legs, I’d
go running to my mom crying!

I didn’t want to flaunt my choice. Not until it was all over with, anyway. I didn’t
want to worry about draping a blanket over my entire lower half the whole night. And
the dress I had always wanted to wear for a very special occasion— a velvet, emerald
green one with sheer long sleeves I had bought with Dad at Filene’s— was meant to
go to the knee.
Not
the ankle. How could I ever wear something beautiful like that with legs like mine?

All I could do was trust in my mom that she would create something to match it, as
she’d promised, so I could dine comfortably. For hours, she sat upstairs in her room,
the motor of her sewing machine spinning away. Just before she revealed her big project,
Mom brought down some of her makeup and a mirror and placed them on my hospital table.

“Here,” she said with a smile. “I think the amethyst shadow would bring out the brown
in your eyes the most.” She slid the
shadow across my table with a thimble-covered finger and went back upstairs.

Fooling around with the makeup, I was reminded of all the times I’d stood atop my
makeshift ladder in Mom’s room, playing with her jewelry. This time was very different.
Now I could reach my earlobes, my bangs, and even the top of my head. As I swept the
deep purple powder across my eyelids, I smiled to myself.

From upstairs, Mom called out to me.

“Here it comes!”

She was so proud of herself. I knew by the expression on her face that even if what
she’d made turned out to be a mess, I would have to at least fake a smile. Hurting
my mom’s feelings would sting far more than being seen in a monstrosity.

When she revealed what she had made to cover my pins, all my worries about people
staring at me faded away. The dress was beautiful. Mom had somehow found the exact
same fabric— emerald green velvet— and attached it to the hem of my original dress.

It had pouf, but it wasn’t too puffy. It was narrow at the waist and flowed to elegantly
cover my legs. There was even a little zipper on the side so that I could wrap my
legs up tighter in case they got cold. I had a ball gown after all.

“I love it!” I squealed. “Thank you! Thank you, thank you!”

“See? I’m good for something,” Mom said with a wink as she brought it over to me.

Little did she know that I thought she was good at everything.

The gown slid on and over the pins with ease. It gave my legs warmth against the crisp
November air without making me too hot. With my matching green satin hair tie in place,
I was officially ready to celebrate my birthday over a nice dinner. Maybe agreeing
to go out wouldn’t be such a bad thing after all.

“Ready, pumpkin?” my dad asked.

“Ready.” I smiled at him and lifted my arms for him to pick me up.

“Let’s go pig out,” he said with a wink. He scooped me up into his arms and carried
me out the front door. That night, Dad had an extra bounce in his step. To me it was
amazing, considering how much more I must have weighed with all that metal attached
to me. I think he was just happy to finally see me out of the house.