I was born with Hypo-Plastic Left Heart Syndrome.  Basically, I was born with only half of my heart.  I had four open heart surgeries within the first 3 years of my life.  These were all done at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.  When I was 16,  I had a spinal fusion to correct an 80 degree curve caused by the scoliosis that resulted from all the chest openings.  I am one of the oldest in the world with this heart disease. 

Well, yesterday was my 22nd birthday!  It was a good day!   My parents came to town on Sunday to go to church with me and then do a birthday lunch.  

I have just started my last semester of nursing school.  Tomorrow I have a 9 hour skills class which I thought was just a review but have since found out will be graded.  Ugh.  I am very organized and hate surprises!!  This semester, we will be in the hospitals three days a week and in class, two.     Each Friday a different hospital program will come and do recruitment at lunch.  Free food!  Yea!   The one thing that I won’t have to worry about will be job placement.  Nurses will always be in shortage.  Which is good for me but bad for the patients.  I definately want to do pediatric cardiology but am not sure of where.  I am still leaning toward my home hospital Le Bonheur.  We have a great new cardiac surgeon and the people I’ve known all my life are there  but who knows where I may end up.  I work as a Patient Care Assistant at Le Bonheur each time I am on break.    I look forward to graduating in 14 weeks!!  Hurray!