Nicole Story page 9

She would drop anything if a friend was in need. She always told them the truth even when they didn’t want to hear it. That’s what real friends do for one another.

Just before she turned fifteen, she fainted at church standing in line at the restroom. She hit her head and ended up in ICU. They discovered several things wrong with her heart. She had a hole between her two atriums, arrhythmia with extra PCPs, Mitral Valve Prolapse and an unknown syncope or fainting. That was October 1998 and we began a journey.

Facing mortality is a challenging experience for adults. At fifteen, it was very frightening. I did what I could to deal with my own fear, which was very high. I didn’t want to add to Nicole’s fear. She turned hers into anger. Anger takes away fear and pain. It also creates a lot of damage of its own. She was in the hospital every week over the next months for tests.  None of the tests ever agreed with the previous one. It was very frustrating. Her cardiologist wanted to wait until summer for the surgery to close the hole.

In the meantime, she acted out. She cut class, drove when she shouldn’t, violated every rule I wanted her to obey, was surly and rude, etc.