I’ve always had a deep admiration for strong female characters. When I was young, I fell in love with Snow White. I know it sounds silly but I did. Later, my respect shifted from Anderson’s “Little Mermaid” to many of the female heroes in anime.

I think it had something to do with my mother. She was born, in 1947, with a condition called spine bifida. It’s a genetic defect where the baby has a gap in his or her spinal column. What usually happens is the spinal fluid invades the surrounding tissue, becomes infected and causes severe spinal and brain injury leading to death.

My mother’s parents did not take the doctor’s diagnosis that my mother was ‘ugly’ and that ’she would die’ as the final word. They searched and searched. Finally, they found a doctor who could help her. He performed a revolutionary surgery that rerouted the spinal fluid and saved my mother from the devastating infection. In 1947, this sort of thing was practically unheard of. Most spine bifida babies were left alone to die.

My mother has since been through a lot of hardship. But she faces it with amazing character and grace. The strain on her body has resulted in two early hip replacements. Otherwise, she has lived an astonishing life. She graduated from the very competitive William and Mary in only 3 years so she could marry my father. Now she provides crisis intervention counseling for teens. It’s really an amazing life. One day, I may write a story about it that’s more direct. For now, the mirror of dreams works nicely.

For my part, I’ve done my best to write about a female hero who shares her disposition if only to inform others through story that such a thing exists. It is also why I am so driven. There’s something about it that’s more than just me.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 5th, 2009 at 3:54 pm and is filed under The Female Hero. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.