Partly Cloudy, 64°
The entire sophomore class is at risk of developing scoliosis due to a particularly potent case of sophomore slump, according to an e-mail Vice President for Campus Life and Student Services Margaret Klawunn sent to the student body last week.
The e-mail reads, "Are you having trouble deciding on a concentration? Feel detached from your friends and classmates? Unable to stand up straight enough to reach the cereal dispensers at the Ratty? If you said yes to these questions, you may be experiencing sophomore slump."
David Wexler '11 said the email was an eye-opener for him. "I had noticed that my posture's been sort of crooked, but I just assumed it was because I haven't been working out much this year," he said dully, before sighing. "It's just hard to motivate myself, especially to focus on work. I used to study with my friends from freshman year, but now it's like, I don't even know if they really get me, you know?" When asked how he was dealing with his misaligned vertebrae, Wexler said, "I guess I've been calling my mom a lot."
Health Services Nurse Mickey Rowen said she sees the condition every year. "They're under so much stress and pressure that their spines actually - and do pardon my medical lingo - bend. Like dining-hall spaghetti! This year is the worst I've seen, though," she said. "These days you can hardly step onto the Grad Center patio without bumping into some serious Quasimodos."
She added that scoliosis usually develops at a young age and is diagnosed with a common test that simply requires patients to bend over at the waist. "Yeah, that was how I realized I had it last weekend," said Kathryn Orlando '11. "Not at the doctor's office, just, uh.Look, I'm under enough stress without your judgments about what I do in my personal life!"
For many, the medical condition is just one of many second-year worries. "It started in October when I realized that I don't know any professors personally. And if I'm gonna go pre-med, I need to start planning for recommendations now. But then again, how do I know if that's, like, what I really want, or just like, what I'm doing because it's what I've always been doing? You know?" Wexler asked.
In her email, Klawunn recommended that students take advantage of the resources available to them, such as counsel from their academic advisors, empathy from their peers, and back braces from Health Services.
Some students, however, express ambivalence about their treatment. "I just feel like my parents are spending all this money for me to have this fancy Ivy League scoliosis treatment, and I'm just wasting it! I feel so guilty," said Wexler. "I hear they have an experimental surgery in London, so maybe going abroad in the spring will give me some perspective - Wait, where are you going? I wasn't done talking about my feelings!...Can you pass me my back brace?"
