I am George Wilson, almost exclusively known to everyone as Georgie, and this is my story. It is a story I have been meaning to tell for a while now, but only recently have I been able or willing to get down to the effort. It is a story about my life, both as is as well as in relation to my friends and family. I hope that my sister will agree to write about her perspective every now and then, but unless I say otherwise, I will be the main narrator.

To cut down to brass tacks: I am 24 years old, and stand 18 inches high, weighing in at about 8 lbs. While my mother knew something was awry with the pregnancy at the time, she didnt know what precisely, despite her hardly showing a baby bump even on the eve of childbirth. Thus, after a full nine months in utero, when I first made my appearance on earth, the doctors were sure my mother had given birth prematurely as my size was 11 inches long, 1.5 lbs heavy, for the most part paralleling a premie. But six months into my stay in the hospital premie ward, I still hadnt grown more than a quarter inch, and the doctors were blaming my "failure to thrive" on my mother's supposed drug use. My mother steadfastly denied such claims.

The doctors were still baffled as how to diagnose my condition three months later, my size still not too much changed, but they couldnt deny that I was surviving, despite my tiny size, and so agreed to release me. In short (ha!), I entered my parents' home some 9 months after birth. My size was mostly unchanged but, my mother claims now, my personality shown and I supposedly brightened the home that had resided in gloominess for the previous several months. In any event, my physical growth was (excruciatingly) slow, but my brain was unaffected so that I was speaking by a year or so old, as most other children, but because my leg muscles were so small and underdeveloped I couldnt walk until I was 6.5 years old and had reached 13 inches tall.

By that time, my doctors were sure my condition was somehow related to primordial dwarfism, although an as-yet undetermined, if more intense, type. While my features are entirely proportional but tiny, my brain is thankfully unaffected, unlike most other PDs who suffer near-, if not total, mental retardation due to an extremely smaller brain. Thus, tiny as I was (and am!), I was (and still am) considered a legend in medical history. 

Clearly, I was too small to participate in most activities with children my age, or indeed many years younger (otherwise there was a great danger to my life; it is extremely humbling to be so small and delicate, and my parents, liberal as they may be, wanted to take no chances) so from the time I was 5 years old, I was home-schooled. Which meant a tutor would come for three hours every day and teach me what she could. She often left me lots of reading material, which I devoured on my own, as reading, not surprisingly, had become one activity in which I could truly excel. I wont say my life was difficult before, but even as a young child, tiny size meant life was no walk in the park.

Thankfully, my life definitely changed quite a bit when I turned 8, and I wont deny it was (and has been ever since) for the better. It was then that my sister, Alexandra, or Lexie for short (ha! she is anything but!), was born. She was on the large size for a newbie, although clearly much more in the "normal" range than I had been. Lexie entered this world at the height of 21 inches and 9.5 lbs. There are many pictures in my home of me lying next to her some hours after birth. To say it would be difficult to tell who was the newbie would not be exaggerating, for there I was, 8 years old and 14 inches long and 4.5 lbs, while my newborn sister was a staggering (to me!) 21 inches, or seven inches longer and some 5 pounds heavier.

So I can say that I was never *longer* than my younger (I've never used "little" for her) sister, although I was technically taller than her for the first 9 months of her life as until then she just lay on her back. Once she started crawling and then sitting, and finally standing up, I was her little doll for life. By the time she started walking, by age 15 months, she was already 34 inches tall (in the normal range, but rather tall, for most infants), and weighing nearly 25 lbs. Now, all these years later, fully grown, Lexie at age 16 stands 6'7 barefoot, 185 lbs and I am much below her knee in height. At 18 inches, even if I stretch my arm over my head and jump I cannot reach Lexie's knee. As hard as this may be to believe, it is still all too true that since my legs are so short, I can literally sit on Lexie's palm and my feet do not reach the end of her fingers! On numerous occasions, I have literally slept in Lexie's glove since they are so warm and comfortable.

I will allow Lexie to have her say soon, but I did want first to introduce to you my best friend and her family. Lauren Hayes and her family moved in next door to us when we were both 2 years old and she has been both literally as well as figuratively my closest friend all these years. While my parents are on the tall side of average (my mom stands 5'11 and my dad is 6'4), Lauren's parents are on the opposite end of the spectrum. Her dad is 5'3 and her mom is 4'10. Which is why Lauren never agrees when some moron calls her a dwarf or little person. She is certainly much smaller than average but, she claims, she doesnt have a dwarfism gene or condition, she is just the product of short(er) genes.

She stands in at a lofty 4'5.5 (or close to 137 cm as she likes to say; it just 'seems' taller) and weighs a mighty 78 lbs. Unlike me, who grew to my final adult height over a long time (I grew my last part-inch when I was 21, so it's been 3 years since any growth), Lauren had reached her final height when she was 14. Back then, the kids in her class already knew she was short, but it only became much more apparent over the next few years as the boys began to tower over her. She was then, and now too, considered very cute and many guys would try their utmost to woo her.

In her gorgeous shoulder length dirty blond hair, which she often wears in a bun, and her size 2 three-inch heels, a variety of which she wore almost every day of high school, she came up under most guys' shoulders, which was perfect for slow dances, if a bit annoying for kisses (or so they say; I wouldnt know). Lauren's younger brother, James, is 17 and 5'2, and close friends with Lexie; their younger sister, Kayla, now 14, is 4'11. So Lauren is indeed the shortest in her family, but no one there is huge.

My parents, and eventually Lexie, were often asked to help the Hayes' in changing a light bulb, or getting a pot from an upper cupboard, or the like. By age 10, Lexie, at 5'5 and 110 lbs, was ecstatic to help the little grown-up neighbors. At the same time, James, about the same age as Lexie, stood only 4'2 and was often embarrassed to be seen when Lexie came round to help, although they enjoyed each other's company and friendship at other times.