By: Lauren Carlo
Can you imagine being told you have a rare disease that’s incurable? A disease that will cause you pain every single day for the rest of your life, even while you’re just sitting? A disease in which you have absolutely no control over what happens and no way to stop it? A disease that will never be “fixed” or healed? Neither could I until it happened in the summer of 2016. Many of you may be thinking this is just another injury because I get injured often, but it’s not an injury. I have to deal with this disease for my whole entire life and that’s the most frustrating part when it comes to people saying “oh what did you do now?”
In August of 2016, I was diagnosed with Freiberg’s Disease. This disease is so rare that in fact I was told that 1 in 1,000,000 people suffer from this disease. I can’t even explain the amount of pain I’m in every single day; it’s similar to the feeling of walking on marbles or legos, and that’s just walking. Can you imagine running on that? Well, that’s what my every day pain level is.
Freiberg’s disease occurs due to a lack of blood supply in the second metatarsal causing the bone to die and collapse. Eventually, pieces of that bone begin to break off. I was told by my surgeon that playing softball with all the movement, pressure from running, and pushing off to dive or take a lead would cause the bone to break off faster due to the repeated stress on the area. However, even walking is a risk of pieces breaking off and once those pieces break off, that’s when surgery comes into play. Although surgery can’t fix the issue, it allows the pieces to be taken out so they don’t get lodged anywhere and cause even more problems down the road.
If you know anything about me, you know that softball has played a huge role in my life. Softball has been my passion since I was just eight-years old. My mother played softball for Westborough High School and my father played baseball all his life. Softball is more than just a sport to me, it’s always been the one thing where I could forget about everything going on in my life. Once I take a step onto that dirt infield, everything else in my life–all the problems, stress, and worries disappear; I just focus on playing the game I love. Now, I won’t have that in my life anymore.
I am a senior in high school and going off to college soon. Athletes who are looking to pursue their career with their sports really begin to speak with college coaches by the end of junior year in order to possibly get recruited to play in college. I was one of those athletes. I looked at specific colleges in which I could continue my softball career and I even met with the head coach from my top choice school. She was very interested in me, came to watch a few of my club games, offered to have me stay over in the fall with the girls, go to classes and practice with them. I had the opportunity to achieve the dream I had since I was eight years old: to play the game that I love for the school that I love. And it was taken from me, just like that.
It wasn’t expected for me to have surgery this soon. It was mentioned multiple times, however, my surgeon believed pieces wouldn’t begin to break off until my mid 20’s or 30’s even. But, that wasn’t the case. I am only 17-years-old and the progression worsened twice as fast as he expected, therefore I needed surgery. Little did I know until a month prior to surgery that getting this surgery would end my 9 year softball career that I worked so hard for.
I played AAU club softball, which is year round, this past year (2016-2017) for a team called New England Blazers. I have played club for the past three years and I have been lucky enough to meet my very best friends because of club softball. The past three years, we played each season together; either different teams due to age groups or on the same team, we always played for the same organization and stuck together. I didn’t know this would be my last year playing club, but I’m glad I was able to have my best friends on the field with me for it.
Ever since I could remember, I was always reminded to never take anything for granted because once it’s gone you’re going to wish you did something differently and have it back in your life. I wish I listened to that advice more and I wish other people, especially teens, would take it more seriously. One day it will be your last game whether you’re aware of it or something happens that keeps you from playing ever again. I wasn’t aware that would be my last game until two weeks after my very last tournament.
However, now it’s all over. No more pregame rituals, no more handshakes on the field with my best friend, no more pep talks, no more tournaments, no more wearing the number 12 on my back, no more playing the game I once fell in love with when I was eight years old. Never did I expect that after nine years playing this game, it would end this way. Never did I expect my dream to be taken from me because of a disease I can’t help, a disease that can’t be cured, a disease that puts me in pain every single day for the rest of my life. But, it was. Just like that.
