I never thought that becoming a mother would change me in so many ways. I love my son. He's my world. I never imagined the hardships that would come our way when we were blessed with such an angel. At 3 years old our son was diagnosed with Legg-Calve Perthes Disease, which is a degenerated bone disease that affects the hips and cause his femur bone to be flat and not the perfect ball that most people have. We struggled for months to try and find out why he had a limp. X-rays didn't show anything and our pediatrician was saying that it was due to growing pains. As a mother I knew that there was something wrong with my baby boy it was instinct. I fought for 4 weeks to get an MRI done and when we were finally granted our request we weren't prepared for the results. It shattered my heart. Here I have this energetic little boy who's life was going to completely change. At first he didn't understand, nor did my husband and I. We went through the stage of why us, why our little boy, why our family. Our son didn't understand his diagnosis until recently at age 5 he asked us to play hockey. Again my heart shattered. A child with his condition is not allowed to play an impact sports. My little boy cried for two weeks when he finally understood what this meant for him. I myself still cry about the impact it has. Last year our lives were forever changed again because we have been blessed with a angel, while watching the Olympics my son grew obsessed with the swimming and when he learned that a swimmer had a different condition and it didn't keep him down he turned to me and said "mom I'm going to swim." I said "Baby you can do whatever you set your mind too." He replied "Mom I'm going to win the gold for all the kids that have Perthes. I'll spread all the awareness. I'll do it for them and I'll do it for me." In that moment I knew that my family was destined to have Perthes affect us. I knew that my little Perthes warrior was going to do amazing things whether he wins the gold one day or not. We are a PROUD perthes family!