Editor's note: "My Story" is a first-person column about health issues that touch New Albany community members. Have a story to share? Email lfreudenberg@cityscenemediagroup.com. Submissions should be no more than 500 words.
I was born without a right hand. My first exposure to opposition was at a very young age, and it surprisingly came from a doctor my mother saw. He told her, “Aaron is going to struggle – it’s going to be hard for him because this is a two-handed world.”
I think my entire life thus far has proved that wrong.
From the beginning, my parents had one word I wasn’t allowed to say: can’t. It literally wasn’t in my vocabulary. People would say, “Aaron can’t do this because he only has one hand,” and my parents would respond back with, “Yes, he can – because we don’t use that word.”
There’s actually a lot of things that people with two hands do with only one hand. I always phrase it as, “I can do everything that someone with two hands can do, I just may do it differently and it may take me longer – but I can still do it.” Sure, as a kid I felt different, but there wasn’t anything I came across that I couldn’t do.
I’d never thought about prosthetic limbs before. I didn’t want one nor did I think I needed one until 2014, my freshman year at New Albany High School, when I happened upon a group of people who were similar to me and my limb difference experiences. For the first time in my life I knew other people who were like me, and I immediately wanted be part of the community – the whole shebang.
So, I started a blog called Alive with Five to document my experiences as someone with a limb difference. That’s when prosthetics really started to spark my interest – I’d spent my life without one, and now, I was suddenly curious about what was really out there for me. That year I went to Schreiners Hospital for Children in Kentucky and got my first prosthetic arm. It was then I realized how outdated the whole process of getting a prosthetic really was. I only went to one consultation and then waited for about seven months until my prosthetic was given to me. I felt excluded from the process, like I wasn’t connected to it. This was supposed to be a personal thing – this was my prosthetic.
This launched me into discovering 3-D printing and researching new and exciting relevant topics during my high school years. I wanted to learn more about the prosthetic process and why it was the way it was – there were aspects that weren’t right and I wanted to fix it.
When New Albany schools received a grant from Massachusetts Institute of Technology to build its very own MIT fabrication lab, I was one of the first students to do an independent project in the innovative space. In 2015, I left the lab wearing my third and final 3-D printed prosthetic arm I made.
Now I’ve created a non-profit I feel I was born to lead. Form5 Prosthetics’ mission is to provide eco-friendly prosthetics for the distressed or underprivileged with congenital and other limb differences. What I do is create a really unique experience. It’s incredible – hard to describe. To give something that someone either never had or lost is really amazing. Every day I get to go home knowing that I can be the person I needed when I was growing up. It’s so cool being able to empathize and relate with these people – like with our first recipient, Maddie. Her and I have really similar limb differences, so when she said something about how her prosthetic hurt or rubbed her the wrong way, I knew exactly how she felt. I always joke that I know from firsthand and one hand experience.
I’ll be candid, it’s been challenging. It’s not an easy thing going to school at The Ohio State University, running a business, having a part time job, and still maintaining a family and social life – it’s a juggling act for sure. But at the end of the day, I get to see the impact in real time and that’s so rewarding.
My work has also helped me learn a lot about advocacy and spreading awareness about limb loss and disabilities. A lot of people have never encountered someone with limb loss, and for those people, I advise to ask, ask, ask, ask, ask. By nature, people are curious. People see my arm and even though pointing and staring isn’t the most respectful thing to do, I know they’re just curious. Parents with little kids always scold them and tell them to look away or don’t stare, but that could have been a learning experience. That could have been a way for a child to understand how a disability or limb difference doesn’t make someone less able.
I’m so excited for the big things coming up with Form5. Nov. 8-11, we’re hosting our inaugural CO-FAB Workshop. During the four-day workshop, students studying mechanical engineering, product design, industrial design and other related fields will work with limb loss individuals to collaboratively turn the recipients’ ideas into a prosthetic. We want Form5 to focus on sustainability and encourage people with limb loss to really be involved and empowered by the process of creating their prosthetics.
Everyone says, “What you’re doing is amazing!” I have a hard time grappling with that because if everyone did what they loved, we would all be amazing and it would be a normality. I’m doing what I love, all while helping people like myself in the process. There’s no doubt in my mind I’m doing what I was put on this earth to do.
Aaron Westbrook is a NAHS graduate who founded Form5 Prosthetics. Feedback welcome at feedback@cityscenemediagroup.com.
