I remember the first time I held my newborn baby brother in my arms. His mouth opened, and he was crying. I couldn't hear him. With my left hand, I reached over and closed it for him. I saw my mother's laughing face and didn't understand. I was almost three years old, and my world had gone silent. My body was my enemy.

And yet, I didn't know enough to question it. It was my normal. I had to adapt. As my brother grew and learned new things, I watched him. When he learned to crawl, I learned to use my arms to pull myself across the carpet on my belly. Eventually, I got to my hands and knees. And when Ryan learned to walk, I crawled over to the coffee table and pulled myself to my feet and took my first steps again. I didn't remember anything about the cancer, the chemotherapy, the hospital. I didn't remember the pain as my body turned on itself. I blocked it out, or maybe it never really registered in the first place. This was a good thing. My mind was free, even if my body was not.

I remember my childhood in bits and pieces, a memory there, a mental block there. When I was almost six, my mother discovered what I wasn't telling her: I had lost most of my hearing. I quickly adapted to this by teaching myself how to read lips. I had everyone fooled. The doctor thought I was just mother-deaf. But my mom tested that theory. I was sitting on the floor facing away from her. She whispered, "Danielle, do you want a candy bar?" No response. She crept closer to me, and repeated the question in a slightly louder voice. No response. Closer. No response. The doctor was wrong. My mom was certain of it. And it turns out that she was right. About three years after the brain stem damage, I got hearing aids. But, I think, that delay only added to my speech problems.

I was a fragile child. Anything and everything could reduce me to tears. Not understanding why I was different only added to the frustration. How could something I didn't even remember still have power over me? I didn't understand who I was, what I was, or even what happened to me. No matter how many times my parents explained it to me, I didn't understand.

It is a challenging task to sort through my childhood memories and find good ones. With so many unpleasant recollections springing to mind, it's easy to remember the scared, lonely little girl I used to be. Yet, there were good moments. There had to be, right?