Watford City teenager Kira Kostad is feeling good and walking tall, but it wasn't always so. Kira, 17, is on the tail end of a five-year journey that has taken her back and forth to Minnesota for medical treatment and a surgery that completely rebuilt her spine with dozens of titanium rods.
It all started when Kira was 12 years old, and her parents and friends noticed a curvature in the girl's spine.
"It got really bad," said Kira's mother, Tina Kostad.
Kira was eventually diagnosed with a type of kyphosis, a condition that causes the spine to grow irregularly and can have lifelong painful effects.
While Kira's condition was not causing her pain, she was noticeably walking at an ever-increasing angle, her mother said. When she was 13, she had to wear a body brace to try and keep the condition in check.
The brace was a heavy, cumbersome device that Kira had to wear to school and everywhere else. In the last five years, wearing that brace was probably the most difficult part of the whole ordeal.
more Williston Herald - Online Edition
It all started when Kira was 12 years old, and her parents and friends noticed a curvature in the girl's spine.
"It got really bad," said Kira's mother, Tina Kostad.
Kira was eventually diagnosed with a type of kyphosis, a condition that causes the spine to grow irregularly and can have lifelong painful effects.
While Kira's condition was not causing her pain, she was noticeably walking at an ever-increasing angle, her mother said. When she was 13, she had to wear a body brace to try and keep the condition in check.
The brace was a heavy, cumbersome device that Kira had to wear to school and everywhere else. In the last five years, wearing that brace was probably the most difficult part of the whole ordeal.
more Williston Herald - Online Edition