A teenager’s life is all about fun, friends, fashion, first crush, second crush. The kids on this list have it much more challenging, and their lives are more about survival.
And they are making the most of their lives under extraordinary circumstances. They’re not looking for pity but acceptance.
10 /10 Rahma Haruna
When Rahma was born, she seemed a perfectly healthy little girl. However, when she was six months years old, her family started noting something strange.
The little girl’s body had stopped growing, but for her head, which developed naturally. Her family lives in a poor Nigerian village, and her father tried in vain to find what’s wrong with the girl, let alone find a cure.
Now a teenager, Rahma spends most of her time in a cheap plastic bowl, dependant on her family for her most basic needs. Her only joy – a tour of the village in the wheelchair, someone was kind enough to donate.
9 /10 Zara Hartshorn
At an age when most of her peers worry about zits, Zara Hartshorn has to wake up every morning and face the wrinkled old lady staring at her from the mirror.
Zara suffers from a rare condition called lipodystrophy. This means that the fat under her skin dissolves, leaving her face full of wrinkles.
As if this was not enough, she had to put up with years of relentless bullying. Her chance at an everyday life came in 2016 when she was offered free surgery to mitigate her condition’s devastating effects
8 /10 Nihal Bitla
Indian boy Nihal Bitla beat the odds and made it to his 15th birthday, which was not much fun, as he was no ordinary teenager.
Nihal suffered from progeria, and by the time he hit his teens, he looked like an older man and had to put up with many of the ailments that come with age.
He was known as a bubbly boy, and a vocal campaigner for people like him despite all that. His greatest hope was that someday there’s going to be a cure for this terrible disease. Sadly, he died shortly after turning 15.
7 /10 Luciana Wulkan
At first look, Luciana is a beautiful young girl and regular, but if you look closer, you’ll notice the unmistakable signs of a terrible condition that’s slowly killing her.
Luciana suffers from a disease that makes her muscles and tendons turn into bone. By the age of 16, part of her body, like her wrists and right hip, had already been locked into place by this terrible affliction.
She can barely move and has trouble eating. There is no cure for this disease, so it’s only a question of time until her body kills her.