Learning to walk all over again
Treatment cured Yen Mei-ling's left leg, but her right leg was not so lucky. Her two legs differed eight centimeters in length and the pain as the right hip joint wore away was hard to endure. Consequently, Yen underwent an operation for an artificial joint when she was 23. Her principal doctor Lai Kuo-an says, "Twelve years ago, my professor chided me for operating on Yen." The success rate for adults was low, and the doctors argued about whether the operation should be carried out. But the outcome was that Yen's right leg was extended four centimeters.
Yen Mei-ling then underwent a half year of rehabilitation at Veterans General Hospital. Ronald Robert, a Catholic priest who is a rehabilitation consultant to the hospital and is handicapped himself, points out that patients have to learn to walk all over again after such an operation. It's hard to imagine the perseverance and endurance needed. But Yen Mei-ling, who cares a lot about her appearance, dressed up prettily every day. If her exercise suit wasn't pink, then it was yellow, and her sneakers always matched.
Yen says that when the artificial joint rubbed against the newly formed muscle, it cut like a knife. During physical therapy, they would constantly raise and lower the leg and move it right and left. "No matter how much I'd try to grin and bear it, I couldn't help the tears from falling," she recalls. And because she didn't want her parents to be miserable at her side, she went every day alone.
Liu Tcho-jen, the director of rehabilitation at Veterans, says that what most impressed him about Yen was that she never doubted that the therapy would work and cooperated with her doctors full of hope. It's just that there are limits to what rehabilitation can do. It can help patients recover such basic functions as walking and going up and down stairs. Yet it can't make them nearly the same as other people.
With the difference between her legs reduced, Yen's walking had much improved, but she was still unsatisfied with her "up-and-down" gait. "I can walk even better!" she believed.
One day Yen saw an advertisement for prospective models, asking for "fine-featured women of at least 170 centimeters." Yen met the requirements and went to the interview full of hope. "Although the teacher Yang Jen-chuan knew that I had problems with my right leg, she was still willing to take me on if I paid my own way through training," Yen says smiling.
After she started receiving instruction on how to walk the runways, Yen had a sudden realization: She had walked unattractively, often falling, largely because of her improper technique. Yen had always walked with arm and leg moving together on the same side. "No one had told me that my method was incorrect." She started to pay close attention to the differences between the way she and others walked: When she walked there was no movement in the right half of the body, her leg didn't extend straight, and she came down on her toes.... Not only did these mistakes make her walk unattractively, but the lack of activity was causing the muscles in the right side of her body to atrophy.
At the start of the second year, after a year of strenuous training, Yen was up on stage performing with the other models. "The movements on stage are more exaggerated, and so the audience couldn't tell the difference," Yen notes, but in reality it wasn't until the third year that she could walk steadily. And as her gait grew graceful, she got a hankering to do something for other disabled people. Hence she began volunteering at the Eden Welfare Association for the Handicapped, the Taiwan After-Care Association, and the Sunshine Foundation of Social Welfare.
Living in society
In 1987 Father Ronald Robert told Yen that the Office Chretien Des Personnes Handicapees was going to hold a fashion show in Paris. Although it was too late for her to attend that show, while gathering relevant information Yen struck up an acquaintance with the president of the organization.
She discovered excitedly that this organization's ideal of allowing the disabled to live among the healthy in society was similar to ideas still gelling in her mind. She believed that the handicapped--just like anyone else--have the right to seek beauty, and so she decided to attend Claire-Renoir College in France and study make-up and styling.
With only a high school education and no grounding in French, Yen relied on just plain old hard work, sleeping only three hours a night. She graduated second in her class and then went on for teacher training at Carole, the French beauty school. Finally, she was appointed Carole's Asian general director, with the right to franchise schools in Asian nations and recruit students. "Fortunately," Yen says, "in the field of beauty and styling prowess with a make-up brush counts for more than book learning."
After returning home, Yen threw herself into beauty work, establishing the Disabled Free Clinic. She left open her Thursday mornings for discussions with disabled people in the hope that they could rid themselves of inner constraints.
"Most disabled people are unwilling to face their own bodies--let alone undergo long-term rehabilitation to improve their physical conditions," Yen observes, noting that disabled people's physical characteristics all differ. She, for instance, can't weigh more than 54 kilos and can't carry more than 20 kilos. If she stands for two or three hours she'll need to rest or otherwise her artificial joints won't be able handle the strain. She believes that the disabled must understand themselves before being able to change themselves.
Yen notes that while the disabled may not be able to walk exactly like other people, they still should strive to walk attractively, with as even a gait as possible--"because outside appearance can affect how one feels inside. Too many of the psychological problems of the disabled stem from their appearance."
Yen went through a rebellious phase in junior high and high school which she now attributes to being unbalanced psychologically. Because the way she walked attracted people's attention, Yen dressed herself flamboyantly. She adjusted her book bag, which was covered with doodlings, so that it would hang below her knees. She cut holes in her jeans and patched them. During summer vacation before her senior year in high school, she even got a crew cut. It got her the nickname "Mr. Yen" and nearly earned her a demerit at school.
"Since people were looking at me strangely anyway, I made them want to look just that much more," Yen recalls.
Patients seeking her guidance during rehabilitation can identify with her as someone who has gone through similar difficulties.
True concern, not blind ambition
Just when everything was rolling, Yen's leg started acting up again. In 1992 she led 10 students to Paris to study styling and make-up, and her leg got injured from simply moving too much. Because the joint had outlived the nine years the doctor had predicted it would last, Yen knew it might have worn down. Yet she bore great pain, not seeking proper treatment until bringing her students safely home.
When the doctor saw the X-ray of Yen's leg, he was shocked. Not only had the artificial joint loosened, but the screws had even broken under the pressure. Lai Kuo-an gave Yen the newest thing in artificial joints, made of a material very similar to bone but even stronger. The difference between her legs shrank to only 1.5 centimeters.
After rehabilitation, Yen once again walked with sturdy steps and a graceful gait. She joined the Office Chretien des Personnes Handicapees, and in October of last year founded in Taipei the China Handicap and Health Association, which promotes removal of the barriers between the handicapped and the able-bodied and coexistence within society as a whole.
Some people wonder why she doesn't work with other groups for the disabled. Why did she found the China Handicap and Health Association?
"I was forced to create the association," Yen explains. She came back from Europe all excited with the idea for it, but many disabled groups were worried that its lively methods wouldn't mesh with the image of the disabled as weak and might reduce sympathy and support for the disabled from society.
To avoid fighting for resources and weakening already established disabled groups, the association hasn't openly sought disabled members.
Among the 100 or so members of the association, only four, including Yen, are disabled. The remaining are active supporters of the group who share its ideals.
Several members of the board, including Steven Hong, the Asia-Pacific executive director of Fulu Industries, have given Yen much help. Shiseido-Taiwan gave more than NT$1 million to help pay for the expenses of putting on activities. "The able-bodied don't have a monopoly on beauty," says Li Hsiou-lian, the company's assistant general manager. "Looking good is everyone's right."
The process of hope
Parents always hope that their healthy children--let alone a disabled daughter--take roads in life that are safe and steady. Yen not only didn't take a government job as her parents had hoped, but she chose to found an association helping the handicapped--hard work indeed!
Her mother points out that since leaving the nest, Yen has "taken money from home"--instead of bringing money to home, as grown Chinese children are expected to do. "If you want to work in charity," she exclaims, "you've got to make the money first!" But nagging aside, Yen's family gives her their unqualified support, whether it be boosting her spirits or her finances. For the July fashion show in Taipei, the whole family made the trip from Hualien to cheer her on.
"I know that I am 'building on hopes,' but it's definitely not some starry-eyed, impractical endeavor," says Yen brimming with optimism. If the principles of the China Handicap and Health Association are put into practice, then the disabled can, like other people, pursue their dreams at every stage of their lives. "By holding the fashion show, I told everyone that anything is possible."
In order to help more disabled people, the China Handicap and Health Association wants to recruit disabled students and design a curriculum for adjusting physical deportment. The content will include psychological adjustment, realizing the full potential of one's limbs, styling and beauty for the whole body, and nutrition and health.
At this point, what Yen needs even more than applause and well-wishing is support and cooperation.
[Picture Caption]
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Yen Mei-ling, founder of the China Handicap and Health Association, believes that the able-bodied and handicapped alike should have the right to freely follow their dreams.
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Flipping through a stack of old photos, the Yens see the events of days past float before their eyes. Yen Mei-ling's bold efforts to make her dreams come true have both made her parents proud and made their hearts ache.
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Although she walked with crutches and was in and out of hospitals, Yen's childhood was not without its happy moments. (courtesy of Yen Mei-ling)
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An unusual cocktail party held in late July was the main event in a series of activities Yen sponsored promoting "obstacle-free space for everyone." (photo by Huang Ching-an)
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With Yen's leadership and encouragement, the handicapped are overcoming obstacles both physical and psychological to take their first steps on the dance floor.