My heroes

My heroes are 2 mothers that I have met online, will call them E. and C. for the purpose of this blog. They have 3 kids each (I think) and one of their daughters has HCH and ACH respectively. The girls are in their teens and have had their first leg lengthening and arm lengthening already. These women and their daughters will probably never know how much their e-mails, blog posts, FB messages have helped me over the last year. They give me hope and guidance for so many of my questions.
These mothers and their kids are real fighters, they haven't given up, they haven't let this diagnosis knock them out, they and their kids couldn't follow the "accept and live with it" route - please understand I am not dismissing this route, I fully appreciate that it is what most Western people are comfortable with. I admire people who can take something that's seemingly negative and make a positive thing out of it. (That's just not me, I am the worst pessimist in the world, my husband has said to me that I should become a worst case scenario adviser for the Pentagon... and I think I might do quite well at the job :-))
But it's hardly the road we will choose to follow. A very wise man who I think actually opposes ELL has said to me so well that in his opinion the choice of ELL is an extremely personal one, it is so dependent on the cultures and traditions you were raised in. It's almost like the question of religion, people exhibit such strong views on it.
I think Western cultures are a lot more individualistic, so I can see how being your own person and everyone being different are values that people admire. Yet to me the choice to allow my child to live life like anyone else seems so natural. So I am keeping an open mind, I am continuing with my research...