Things about me:
I am Lisa Stolk and at the moment of writing i am 19 years old. But let’s start at the beginning, because I had quite the journey over the past 19 years. I was born with Spina Bifida and hydrocephalus ( and some other medical things), because of this I spent my first 2 weeks in the hospital for several operations and tests.
Throughout the years at primary school I missed a lot of classes due to illness, operations and hospital admissions. This is why I was always very happy when I was able to go to school, my classmates found it really strange that i enjoyed it. The first appointment after a surgery I always asked when I could go back to school, his answer always was that I depended on how I was feeling. If you would leave that up to me I was going the next day, but my parents wisely said that I had to rest before going to school again and to build school hours up.
One time I had to stay in the hospital for an observation and during this time I was able to go to the hospital school. This was very nice, because then I was not that far behind on the rest of my classmates when I came back. Thankfully my last surgery was 7 years ago which is a new record because at that time I was 12 years old and had 24 surgeries, you do the math. 😉
Something else I am really thankful for is my family, because I think that they are the reason that I do not have any childhood trauma’s from all my hospital visits. My mother would always stay with me and we made the best out of the hospital stays. We brought candles on battery and made our own campfire with it. My mother and I are a really good team. After a surgery both my parents waited for me and sometimes even my older Brother.
That is enough about hospitals, now over to a more cheerful part of my life.
I got my first wheelchair when I was about 1,5 years old. This was very nice and gave me a lot more freedom. Over the years I have had a lot of different wheelchairs and they all had different colors, my last 2 even had glitters.
Due to my disability not everything that is normal for most teenagers is also for me, but I achieved a lot over the years and that has brought me all the way here. you can achieve a lot with a positive mindset. In 2015 I did a wheelchair cursus. This was organized by Wheelchair Skills Team with Kees-Jan van der Klooster. During one of the reunions I did an interview with the youth journal. If you want to see some of the articles and interviews I have done you can find them under the header of Leisure activities. Here you can also find things about the sports I have done and still do, my side job and some interviews I have done.
I can do anything except walking.
Lisa Stolk