"Why do you wear that? Did you fracture your leg?"

This is a question one of my young patients hears almost daily at school. He has right-sided hemiplegic cerebral palsy and wears an ankle-foot orthosis (AFO) to support his gait. But the AFO, meant to help him move with ease, often becomes a symbol of difference, misunderstood, questioned, and sometimes mocked. “I’m tired of explaining that it’s not a fracture,” he says. “It’s tightness in my leg. It’s just how I walk.”

Children like him, minimally involved, high-functioning individuals with CP, often fall through the cracks of our educational and social systems. They are too able for special schools, yet too different to fully blend into mainstream classrooms. This in-between space can be isolating. Their physical challenges may be subt

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