What if people said or did something incredibly hurtful to you at exactly the wrong time in your life? What if they did it because you wear a prosthesis? What if one of them was a kid? Or a religious zealot?

What if people said or did something incredibly helpful to you at exactly the right time in your life? What if they did it because you wear a prosthesis? What if one of them keeled over – don’t worry, not dead; just unconscious – just as they said it? Or inserted their good leg for your missing one – don’t worry, not transplantation; just an optical illusion – as you saw yourself as a “handicapped” person for the first time?

In this month’s Amp’d, The Amputee Mommy and I share our (vivid) memories of the worst and best things ever said to us about our prostheses. In honor of Halloween, an evening of scary creatures coming to your door, we start with the bad. And in honor of Thanksgiving, which is right around the corner, we end on a high note, sharing stories of positive transformation that still resonate with us today.