News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto, 28, of Toledo, coaches Stritch lifts, a general fitness class at Cardinal Stritch Catholic High School on weekdays in Oregon, Ohio. Ms. Cervetto works as a coach and a receptionist part-time, while using other parts of her day to manage her genetic condition, Ehlers-Danios syndrome. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Hunter Severns, of Toledo, sit on the couch with his fiancé Lauren Cervetto in their downtown apartment in Toledo. Mr. Severns and Ms. Cervetto have been engaged for about a year now, and Ms. Cervetto is comforted and supported by her relationship with Mr. Severns through her chronic pain management of Ehlers-Danios syndrome. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto shows a fingernail that did not grow back after a surgery that was meant to propagate growth to her fingernails in Oregon. After many hand surgeries Ms. Cervetto’s fingernails started to grow inward due to her Ehlers-Danios syndrome, and she remarked that of the 28 surgeries she had in the past decade removing the fingernails due to their inward growth was the most painful of all of her procedures. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto experiences her shoulder dislocate while sitting in a cafe in Toledo. Ms. Cervetto experienced partial and full dislocations in her body on a regular basis, due to the connective tissue breakdown of Ehlers-Danios syndrome and relocates them herself or asks someone to help her. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto looks through the many Doctor contacts she has in her phone over the number of years dealing with Ehlers-Danios Syndrome in Toledo. One of the main doctors Ms. Cervetto has worked with over the years, Dr. Frogamani, has given her his personal phone number, and she nicknamed him "The Maintenance Man" after he repaired her shoulders and knees multiple times over after the connective tissues stretched out. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto renders an anatomical hand with blood vessels, muscle and ligament as a therapeutic exercise to deal with her chronic pain from Ehlers-Danios syndrome in a cafe in Toledo. Throughout the day Ms. Cervetto glances at the number three tattooed on her index finger to remind her to manage the pain on a scale of 1-10, and that however high pain is on the scale it is “just a three." (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto takes pain medication in the afternoon in her apartment in Toledo. To deal with the pain from Ehlers-Danios syndrome Ms. Cervetto takes four ibuprofen three times a day, two Gabapentin three times a day and Tramadol twice a day if there are no complications. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto, 28, of Toledo, coaches Stritch lifts, a general fitness class at Cardinal Stritch Catholic High School, coaching on weekdays in Oregon, Ohio. Even with her surgeries and the threat of dislocating her body parts permanently, Ms. Cervetto maintains an active life, and takes every opportunity to live it to the fullest. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto coaches kids while they run during Stritch Lifts, a general fitness class at Cardinal Stritch Catholic High School in Oregon, Ohio. “I try to be more naive about [the incurable nature of EDS],” Ms. Cervetto's fiancé, Hunter Severns, 28, of Toledo, said, while she herself admitted trying to not think about inevitably ending up in a wheelchair due to Ehlers-Danios syndrome. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto walks with Kathy Atkinson whom Cervetto met in a facebook group centered around chronic pain, in downtown Toledo. In the morning Ms. Atkinson and Ms. Cervetto create a special kind of community that only exists between people who manage constant chronic pain. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)
![News Picture Story - Award of Excellence, “Rejoining the Joints”Lauren Cervetto coaches kids while they run during Stritch Lifts, a general fitness class at Cardinal Stritch Catholic High School in Oregon, Ohio. “I try to be more naive about [the incurable nature of EDS],” Ms. Cervetto's fiancé, Hunter Severns, 28, of Toledo, said, while she herself admitted trying to not think about inevitably ending up in a wheelchair due to Ehlers-Danios syndrome. (Stephen Zenner / The Blade)](images/nps4_20.jpg)
