21-year-old to have legs amputated after legs locked straight, bent backwards

A young woman will have both her legs surgically amputated after they bent at a 45-degree angle upwards.Megan Dixon, 21, has been left with unbearable, constant pain for the past eight years when her legs were fixed completely straight.Megan, who also suffers from functional neurological disorder (FND), has bewildered doctors who have not been able to find a cause of her condition.But she says it has taken them so long to take action that her only choice left is to have them both amputated as she struggles with basic, daily tasks.Megan, from Cambridgeshire, is fundraising for an electric wheelchair to bring back her independence post-amputation – having not walked since she was 14.She said: “It was the hardest when I met with the amputee clinic and they said amputation was my best and only option.“I was hoping deep down they would say there was another way.“But this is my reality now, and I haven’t fully come to terms with it yet.”Megan first became ill when she was 13-years-old, suffering from whooping cough and glandular fever.A year later, she found her legs began to stop working, and she hasn’t walked since.Megan, who was initially diagnosed with myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), had physiotherapy, but her legs had locked straight.She said, “From there I got worse and worse.“I started to go into a comatose-like state.When I was 16, I stopped being able to sit up by myself, and I started to lose the ability to speak.“My paediatrician was concerned I’d had a stroke, so I was rushed to hospital.“I was supposed to be in for tests over four days – I came out a year and a half later.”At Bristol Hospital, Megan lost her speech, mobility, strength, and her sight.She was diagnosed with FND, a condition where the brain struggles to send and receive signals correctly.She became paralysed from the neck down, needing an NG tube in her nose for feeding.Megan said: “I could feel my bones in my legs grating together, but I kept being told the pain w...