Amy's Blog

The Greatest Gifts in Small Packages

    Most of us mark time in our lives by big events; graduation from high school or college, getting that first big job, falling in love and getting married, having a child.  Of course there are sad events as well, whether it's a parent dying or a traumatic health experience. For me, 1986 is a year I'll always remember with a heavy heart because my dad died suddenly from a heart attack. He was just 50. I also remember the space shuttle Challenger exploding with the vibrant young teacher Christa McAuliffe on board with the crew. I was working in a newsroom at the time, producing a noon newscast when that happened. I'll never forget how sad everyone was about the loss to our country and to the families directly affected. My point is we all have certain dates in our lives that forever change us. 

Today I spoke with a young lady who will never forget 2010. Two major life changing events have happened to her personally this year. She delivered a baby boy and received a new heart, in that order!   23 year old Jessica Waters lives in East Tennessee and while we talked about what's happened to her, I could hear her little boy, Elijah cooing in the background.  Jessica just sounds happy and healthy and excited about life. There probably was a time when she had some doubts about her future.

  Jessica had cancer as a baby. Doctors discovered a tumor when she was only eighteen months old and she had to have chemotherapy. Fast forward to her being 20. It was just a fluke that she found out her heart was in bad shape. Jessica said she'd dressed up for Halloween in a costume with high heels. After taking a spill down some steps, she ended up in the doctor's office and because of that, doctors discovered  damage to her heart from the chemo years earlier. It was very serious. Doctors at Saint Thomas here in Nashville had to implant a pacemaker and defilbrillator.  She also was  prescribed medications to control her heart failure. But life was still good because she had met her future husband soon after that and they married in January of 2009. Jessica asked her doctors if she could try to get pregnant with her heart condition and they said yes, but she was not expecting to be expecting so soon!  She got  pregnant in May of '09, and delivered a healthy baby boy  on her birthday, January 4th!  All through her pregnancy, she had no health problems and wasn't even sick, but in March of this year, Jessica had to be placed on the LVAD, a pumping device that does the work of the heart. That meant she would be placed on a heart transplant list.

  The good news is her second gift in a small package came June 29th; a new heart.  Heart transplant surgeons at Saint Thomas took care of Jessica. She said from the surgeons, Dr. Aaron and Dr. Chomskey to the nurses to the transplant coordinator, everyone took such good care of her at Saint Thomas. She only was hospitalized 9 days after the transplant surgery.

   She says she feels amazing and never knew what a normal heart felt like until she got the new one. Now she can chase her little boy around and look forward to watching him grow up.  

   2010-a year forever etched in Jessica Water's mind, with each heartbeat and with a son who will one day know the story of his amazing mom and the amazing medical miracles that happen every day.            

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