USA Thalidomide Survivors in the News
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Introduction
Introduction You can call me "JoJo." My name is Jose Martynov G. Calora. I was born in 1962 in Ithaca, New York, with congenital deformities in my upper extremities. I have short arms, no elbows, and three fingers on each hand. The technical term is phocomelia. My...
My Life in Shorthand — Chapter 5
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MINISERIES I was excited to move to a new place and happy to be back on an Army Base. I later learned that was probably due to the maturity level of Army Brats as they are lovingly referred to by all. After the miserable year of having only 1/2 of...
My Life in Shorthand — Chapter 4
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MINISERIES My sister was not just 8 years older but she was a TALL teenager. i was 4 feet tall when she was 6 feet tall. She kept me tough by wrestling with me, giving me grief if I ate like a slob, and teased me if i wet my pants. She said "they...
My Life in Shorthand — Chapter 3
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MINISERIES Less than a year after that lonely horrid hospital stay we moved to Massachusettes (from Va.) 1st time we lived off an Army base. We had a super cool kid-friendly house cuz the entire daylight basement was turned into a playhouse for me...
My Life in Shorthand — Chapter 2
AN AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL MINISERIES I was born in Germany to white American parents stationed in Frankfurt. My mother had always been worried she'd get pregnant but never really wanted children. My sister was born 8 years my senior. She was born unable to move her neck to...
My Life in Shorthand — Chapter 1
An autoBIOGRAPHICAL MINISERIES Part One of how Thalidomide affected my life.... Do you remember that Steve Martin movie where his character starts out by saying "I was born a poor black child." ? He said that cuz everyone he looked at, his whole family, was black. At...
The Glass Ceiling of Thalidomide
I am sitting right now, looking upward at a glass ceiling right above my head, so close that it concerns me. I can see where I want to go, but I can’t get there.