CASA - How It Changed My Life For The Better
My name is Paul Walsh and I was born in March 1971. I am
different
to other people as I was born without any arms. Up to 1988, I had
artificial hands, but I developed scoliosis, which is a curvature
of the spine, and therefore was unable to continue using them. As
you can imagine, my life has not been easy. As a child, watching other
kids engaging in "normal" childhood activities such as playing
hurling or football, I would always wonder why me, why was I not like
all the other children. I had to cope with difficulties that most
people couldn't even begin to imagine. Things that came so easy to
others, I had to learn to do.
There are so many things that I wanted to be able to do for myself, but, without any arms, I just couldn't. I had to learn to perform such basic tasks as eating and washing using my feet and toes as a substitute for fingers and hands.
Today, I love to write and play the keyboards. These I can do using
my feet. I used to go to mass on Sundays, but I really wasn't interested
in religion. I suppose I was very angry with God for not giving me
hands like other people. I dreaded the "sign of peace" and
would always hope that the priest wouldn't say "now we offer
one another a sign of peace" because if someone offered me their
hand in peace, I had no hand to reciprocate with.
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