PHOTO COMPOSITE COURTESY SHIRLEY SYPERT
Shirley Sypert, left, recovered from polio long ago but has post-polio syndrome, which affects the nerves. Sypert produces "A Class Act," featuring, clockwise from left, Britney Arakaki, Catherine Sypert, Ayami Ogawa, Ryan Berney and Jonathan Sypert.
Polio symptoms resurface
New challenges loom for
a performer and teacher who
refuses to give in to disabilityA crippling infectious disease failed to keep Shirley Sypert from her dreams of becoming a singer and dancer.
She walked with a limp for 14 years after she was stricken with polio in the first 10 months of her life in Hayward, Calif.
"I was just screaming and screaming all the time," she recalled. "My feet were deformed."
The polio virus causes paralysis, destroying nerve cells that activate muscles. It mostly affects children under 3.
It was eliminated from the United States and other developed countries with introduction of vaccines in the late 1950s, but it still cripples thousands of children every year in developing countries, primarily India, Nigeria and Pakistan.
The drama ended happily for Sypert -- or at least the first act. Fully mobile and pain-free for decades, she has discovered that polio can return with a cruel, second wave of symptoms.
AS A CHILD with 11 active siblings, Sypert recalled, "I so wanted to walk. ... My right leg was very thin. I walked on the toes of my feet."
When Sypert was 14, she said, doctors through the Polio Children's Foundation said they heard she wanted to be a dancer and offered to help her with an operation.
"Who would have thought?" she said, describing the "miracle" that followed.
The surgery corrected a deformity in her left foot.
"They took the bone out and restructured it, and the right foot they remodeled."
Within six months she was walking, and within eight years she was in a show, "Catch a Rising Star," that went to New York, she said. She also performed in "Jesus Christ Superstar."
In Nashville, Tenn., she sang gospel in the production of "Liberty's Song" at the Grand Ole Opry.
Sypert came to Hawaii in 1978, raised three children and sang with various groups, such as the Rich Crandall trio, Kaliokai, led by Les Cabral, and the Brian Robertshaw band Sea Breeze.
Encouraged by Kay Kagawa, retired principal of Jefferson Elementary School, Sypert began teaching music there and has since left "a legacy that music is good stuff" at many Honolulu schools.
She now has after-school performing arts classes at Star of the Sea, called "Star of the Sea Li'l Stars."
Sypert also established a performing arts business, Vocal and Dance Expressions, that presents kids performing in "A Class Act." The family TV show airs on 'Olelo, Channel 52, at 6 p.m. on Fridays.
But now, at 58, Sypert is suffering from the symptoms of post-polio syndrome, which doctors estimate affects about 25 percent of polio survivors.
The condition is caused by the death of individual nerve terminals, resulting in fatigue, progressive muscle weakness, muscle and joint pain, and muscular atrophy.
Sometimes she would "just drag these feet" to her car after school, she said. "My nerve endings couldn't take it anymore. I would just cry in so much pain."
Despite increasing pain and weakness, she said she "was in denial for years" about her symptoms until a doctor told her she was partially disabled.
Leaving his office, she said, "I just sat in the parking lot and bawled. I said, 'OK, this is reality. You have to realize you can't do all the things you had been doing.'"
She said her 96-year-old mentor, a voice coach and retired teacher, told her she should slow down. "Now I have to adjust," she said.
A friend put her in contact with a Post-Polio Syndrome Support Group last December. "It was so neat," she said. "I thought I was the only one in the world having this."
BY PRODUCING a monthly TV series on 'Olelo, Channel 54, called "Post-Polio Syndrome & Me," Sypert said she wants to "put a face on people who had polio" and now have post-polio syndrome.
She played tournament tennis until two years ago, when she began to lose her balance, she said. It also hurt to wear flat shoes, such as tennis shoes.
She must use a cane periodically because of limited movement, she said. "I'm in so much pain, and I don't want to take a lot of medications."
She hopes by sharing stories of polio survivors, family members and doctors on her new TV series that "we will bring public awareness to a condition (post-polio syndrome) that is catching many of us by surprise."
According to some estimates, she said, there are 700 to 800 polio survivors on Oahu but only about 13 in the Post-Polio Syndrome Support Group.
The group meets from 10 a.m. to noon every second Saturday in the March of Dimes building, 1451 S. King St., she said.
She said Jane Marcum, the group chairwoman, has asked her to talk about the "Post-Polio Syndrome & Me" TV show at the May 10 meeting.
Sypert, who writes music to inspire children, said her favorite line from one of her favorite songs on the CD, "A Class Act -- Fresh Start," is, "So what if life has thrown you a curve, you can dish it out the next time when YOU serve."
"A little bit of tennis play there," she said, "but overall, these words sort of reflect where we've all been numerous times in our lives."
Unable to dance now, she plans to turn her talents to writing memoirs from journals she kept while traveling and to record her teaching style in a manual and student workbook.
"I never have blamed anyone for my situation," she said. "You make your life what you want it to be. I could wallow in self-pity, but I decided I was going to walk like everyone else."
Not only that, she said, the doctors who operated on her feet "gave me wings to fly."
