“A battle we had to win” by MK

Está entrada es un trabajo que tuvo que hacer mi princesa mayor para la escuela, le pidieron escribir unas memorias.... y esto, es lo que entrego.

Introduccion

My parents were married on September 2, 2000. They had been together long before that, but that day was the beginning of everything, the beginning of a new family, a never ending relationship, and a new life because my parents didn’t have an easy childhood, but that’s another story.

I was born in 2002. In 2004 my little brother came to life, and in 2008 my family was complete with my baby sister.

My mom and dad had always liked a little exercise, running was their favorite. They ran marathons all over the US; New York, Chicago, Miami, and Big Sur. My mom loved running, it was the best part of her day, and my dad; well he ran chasing her. I remember every morning before I woke up they were already out the house to go for a run and when they had come back they made a tub full of ice and went in. I also remember that before every marathon they had, they ate carbs so that they had strength for the next day, but New York was the last marathon they ran together, or they ran at all.

In May 21st, 2012 was the day my mom entered the hospital with pneumonia and from that day on she couldn’t run ever again. That’s when it all started.

Now my dad can’t run anymore without the remorse of running without her. And every day he tried to run, my mom was left behind in their bed.

When it all started

Everything started on February, 2012 with a psoriasis on drops and in May the same year she had pneumonia and entered the hospital.

Her heart rate started elevating and the doctors couldn’t understand what was happening to her. They put her in several treatments, none of them were effective and our world was starting

 to fall. They took her to the lab for every analysis that has ever existed, but nothing happened and her symptoms were starting to increase. There were so many thoughts in my head while I saw my mom go from hospital to hospital, seeing my dad so nervous and my little sister needing her mom and I didn’t know what to do or what to say. Little by little her diagnostics started changing and that’s when the insipid necrogenuc diabetes, the suprarrenal insufficiency and the possible autoimmune disease called Sjögren started to appear. But in that moment they let her walk in the mornings for about 30 to 60min a day and that for her was glory. She felt very happy and strong again every morning when she suited up to go to the gym, her joy of feeling strong again could be felt all over the house, I could feel it, my siblings could feel it, my dad could feel it and it was great.

October 26 of 2012 came, her first faint came along and all over again they prohibited her every kind of exercise including driving. The doctors, my dad, me, everyone thought that my mom just has a disautinomic problem but now they knew that she also had a disease called Pots that stands for Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, and that when the doubts started all over again but the Sjögren was still in the package. Every day was another day when her symptoms increased, her dizziness was stronger and the faints happened 2 or 3 times a week.

But the battle didn’t end there, there were still many diagnostics that had been done, and even though it was tough it was a fight we had to win.

March 26, 2013

The Mayo Clinic

The day came, and the tears for two days hadn’t stop. It was time to say goodbye because my mom was going to the Mayo Clinic, a clinic where her doctors thought could figure out what was happening in her body. My uncle had came for us to go to the movies, and my parents had to go to catch their flight so we had to say goodbye. I saw how my sister hugged my mom with a big smile on her face, looking straight into my mom’s eyes, then my brother with his eyes full

 of tears hugged my mom and cleaned her tears and at I hugged her at last with tears all over my face, hugged my mom and told her not to leave because; why if she leaves and never comes back?, but I blocked that idea out of my head. After a few minutes my dad came and took my mom away and my uncle took me and my siblings. The next morning my parents weren’t home, they had left to Rochester, and the house felt lonely even though my siblings were there. Right after I came home I called my parents and they told me what was going on. They arrived and the sky was grey, everything was covered with snow, the few trees that were left didn’t had any leaves and in the streets, well there wasn’t anyone all around the square. My parents didn’t know if they would cry or if they would laugh, so they laugh instead, and suddenly they saw a big red target, that for some reason made my mom very happy. They arrived at the hotel and my mom was so tired that they arrived, checked in, and went to sleep. They were in Rochester for about 12 to 15 days, while my siblings and I were all alone in our house in Mexico.

The next day, the day after that and so on, were filled with labs, injections, treatments, and doctor talks. It was hard to think that now my mom was a part of the ill people all around the world now and that wouldn’t change. The only hope my parents, my siblings and I had was seeing each other again.

June 26, 2013

The day

My mom for the past few months had come and go from the Mayo Clinic, but now, this trip was the one. This time they went so many people with her and with my dad. Maria Borbolla, Juan Borbolla, my mom’s family, and my dad’s family, but my siblings and I needed to stay home.

It was Tuesday I think, and it was time for the surgery. The doctors needed to cut a nerve on my moms neck to see if her heart rate came up, but it was a dangerous surgery so everyone including me were nervous about it. The time came and my mom had to go, my dad waved her

 goodbye with a knot in his throat and his head full of things. My dad and all the people with him were waiting until he had the call, the call that will tell him that the surgery has started, and half an our later he got the call. The surgery lasted one hour and a half and when it finished the doctor personally came to tell my dad. His eyes were starting to fill with tears, his mouth started to smile, and he started to calm down. He told everyone what the doctor said, he said that everything was good, and that the surgery couldn’t have gone better. Right away my dad called me and the weight I had in my shoulders came off, along with my fear. A few minutes later my mom arrived with a grin of her face, but very exhausted and with a dried mouth, but they were happy, so I was happy.

December 17, 2013

For what?

Today everything was okay, my mom had a medical appointment in the morning and everything went fine, then as usual she went to work and in the evening she had another medical appointment but with the cardiologist which wasn’t fun. Her heart problem was one battle that we won, as well as her heart rate thanks to the surgery she had at the Mayo Clinic, or so we thought. Her normal heart rate lasted a few months because little by little her heart rate started elevating again and in the medical appointment with the cardiologist reaffirmed it, “her heart rate was elevating again”.

That’s how this goes, first she has surgery, then it works, and now, well it doesn’t. When my parents knew that the surgery didn’t work it broke my parents heart in half, because it wasn’t just a surgery, it was a surgery that made the left side of my mom’s body get weaker and different than the right side, the “normal” side. Now we don’t now what the future will be, if there will be more trips to the Mayo Clinic, or more surgeries, or more difficult surgeries, we never know.

I was sure that everything will have a solution and that we together could fix it, but we had to start all over again, from the beginning.

 February 24, 2014

The new batter

The past thursday my mom had a surgery to prepare her for this one. We are only a few hours away until my mom had her pacemaker or how she calls it “battery”. The fact that my mom wouldn’t have a heart that doesn’t have an elevated heart rate was a dream come true. From that day on my mom won’t have a problem with her heart rate or with her heart at all. It was something that make my family looked for hope, something that even though we took some steps back this was a big step forward and that was great. My dad couldn’t wait until she had her pacemaker, he would take my mom out for dinner and she wouldn’t be as tired as she was. My mom will be able to get back to work and to do stuff that she couldn’t.

Before her surgery we were in my parents room and my dad started explaining us a little about how the surgery will be and why it will work, just by listening to him, me and my siblings were already imagining how our future will be, she would carry my sister, or ride a bike with us, or even go on a trip my mom and I alone.

That’s it, we are a few hours away until her heart problem was over, until she could have a little of her past life, a few hours until our problem was resolved and until we had won the first battle again. From now on I won’t write about my mom and how she got worse but how she got better. This moment is when we appreciate our lives, we see that everything is worth the effort and that what comes to us is something that we can learn from.

April 5, 2014

The end?

It was morning and my dad had planned to go for a run but my mom was wide awake and ready to go for a walk so my dad instead of running went for a walk with her. They went to a street that was full with trees and smelled nice and little by little they started remembering

 everything that had happened through this past years and how things were rough but we got through them. There’s many memories that we as a family have good and bad and thanks to that we can write a book filled with them.

At the end we see how fortunate we are, how this changes our lives and who we are now, and how we are better and stronger people thanks to that. It was an amazing feeling knowing that this was behind us and that everything was okay.

The only thing I can say is it’s finished, we won the battle, and everything is okay.

August 27, 2014

The nutrients

We had thought that everything was finished but it wasn’t, the heart problem was just one of it but now there’s more.

My mom got to the lab for some analysis the doctors asked her, and when they got backed she wasn’t getting any nutrients even though she eats more calories than a Krispy Kreme doughnuts and more protein than a ham.

That day she was very quiet, she didn’t say a word all day long, she just sat there and cried. Everyone tried to hug her but nothing worked she just pushed us away. I didn’t understand what was happening the only thing I knew was that she wasn’t absorbing any nutrients and she needed an IV.

October 6, 2014

IV to go

IV stands for intravenously that was what my mother had been going through until today, well maybe. That morning my mom was dehydrated and with a headache that she couldn’t support it, so the doctor said that she needed an IV but this time in the house.

My mom didn’t understand what he meant until he said that he knew a guy who can help her with a nurse and that the ABC Medical hospital will sent her a nurse so that she can put the IV

 in. She was so excited, I was so excited, everyone was so excited because now my mom wouldn’t be going to the hospital every two weeks. The best feeling was when my mom smiled and thought that she could be in her own bed, with her own bathroom, and her own food.

That day my mom was dizzy, had headaches, and exhausted but now she could be here, home.

A few months passed, and after many IV to go, her veins couldn’t handle it anymore. Every time they had to put the needle in her, her veins swallowed and started to become purple. She was very hurt and injured and every two weeks she had to the suffer of going through it again so the doctor decided to bug a catheter on her. She had a surgery that went very well and until that moment her veins didn’t hurt anymore. Instead they insert the needle in the catheter that was in her right side but that didn’t hurt.

Everything was great, she had to be hydrated but in our house and with the catheter so it wasn’t so bad.

The End, for real.

Now everything it’s okay. She still faints sometimes but nothing unpredictable or out of normal. She passes her days half in work an half in the house with us. She still gets tired very fast, gets hydrated, and also she now has very strong back pains but that doesn’t stop us of doing anything.

It was November 18, 2017. I got home with my two siblings and my parents weren’t there, so I tried calling. My mom answered and told me everything was okay but that she was in the hospital and that she couldn’t go to the very special event that my brother had but it was okay. When my dad came to pick us he started explaining everything that had happened.

She had gone to a medical appointment with the neurosurgeon that for some months had injected my mom with something that could help her with her back pains, but this time he was trying to injected her something stronger. She sat in the designated place and started to inject her 16 times. She feels dizzy but nothing abnormal so she lays down and for a few minutes she

 starts convulsing when suddenly she opens her eyes but the convulsing doesn’t stop, and starts doing weird noises. The doctor said that she has done this in the past but just a few minutes but this time is passed 20 minutes and the doctor starts worrying, they grabbed her hands and called the nephrologist and took her to emergencies. When they got back they asked my dad to go out and he said literally “she’s dead”. He starts to cry and called the family and Maria Borbolla who had been there through all of this. After a half an hour my mom was in a comma and I remember her telling me that she could hear the doctors calling her but she couldn’t answer, she was so afraid. Time passed and she came back again and my dad was the happiest.

In those 2 hours my mom could have died as well as all over these years. No one told me but there were times were she died and times were she could but that’s in the past. Now the only thing I can say is that I’m happy, and I’m okay with my mom being sick because even though it was tough it was something that needed to happen so I could become the person I’m today.

I thank my mom for being with me and not ever leaving my dad, my siblings and me. I hope that everything stays this way forever.

MK