17/01/2022
In September of 2014, my life changed forever. I was a passenger in a car, and we got in a small fender-bender. This accident was very small and minor with minimal damage to both vehicles. We went to school and carried on about our days. About an hour post-accident, I began acting very strange. I laughed uncontrollably like outbursts of laughter, I could not sit still, and I had a terrible headache. I went to the school nurse and then immediately to the ER (where I told the nurse my name was “Supergirl.”) After tests were ran, I was diagnosed with a minor concussion, no big deal, right? Much to mine and my parent’s surprise, this would be the beginning to a long, difficult road.
All of my life I have been the straight-A perfectionist that played whatever sport that was in season. In high school, I devoted all of my time to grades and basketball. I knew that I felt different; however, I pushed myself to continue playing the sport I loved. I went from being able to run 6 miles without stopping to not even being able to make it across the court without hyperventilating, fainting, puking, and just wanting to stop. I pushed through and at the end of the season we went on a team trip to watch a basketball game at Mercer University. A coach called my mom and said he watched me on the trip, and he knew something was wrong and I needed help, ASAP.
Again, I pushed myself to continue. Eventually, this “pushing” caught up to me, and I was rushed to Wolfson’s ER at 3:00 am. I received 2 bags of fluid, and I was still dehydrated. I lost 18 pounds in ten days. I was immediately placed on homebound from school until someone could figure out what was wrong with me. In the meantime, I was still losing weight, fainting,
vomiting, getting dehydrated, etc. until eventually, by the grace of God, I was accepted as a patient of Monroe’s Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tennessee.
I found out there that although my concussion was mild, it caused me to have post- secondary concussion syndrome. The part of my brain that was hit was my autonomic nerve which caused me to also have a condition called Dysautonomia/POTS. Dysautonomia is when your autonomic nerve does not work the way it should. The autonomic nerve controls all of your involuntary functions such as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure, etc. POTS stands for Postal Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome. POTS affects your blood flow when you are in different positions such as sitting, standing, lying flat etc.
Having Dysautonomia/POTS has not been easy to say the least, but I continued to push. I could no longer play basketball, but I did get to come back to school my senior year. While going to college, I took a job as a CNA at a nursing home, and I eventually made it to being a PCT at Memorial Satilla Health. I tried, and I pushed. I attend school at The College of Coastal Georgia in Brunswick, Ga and I am hoping to get my Associates of Science in Nursing so that I can help people like myself. College is not easy for me by any means, but I trust God has a plan and I push through. Unfortunately, last semester I had to go to the hospital here in Brunswick by ambulance for my Dysautonomia/POTS.
I have new symptoms now, and I am having to go to the adult clinic by Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tennessee. I am not ashamed of my story any longer because Luke 8:39 says “Return home and show how great things God hath done unto thee.” I know that one day my story will help others.
