I Am A Ticking Time Bomb

• Skye Hone, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2018

This is my story and why I want to live every moment to the fullest.

Some people believe that it must be so hard for me to take each breath, think that my life must be so terrifying to live; my doctors, nurses and surgeons are so confused on how each day my body is somehow still taking in air into and expelling it from my lungs, my heart still beating as though it does not want to ever stop, something that my medical prediction did not predict. I still wake up with an optimistic and hopeful smile, praying that I will live beyond today and wake up tomorrow to watch the beautiful colours of the sky change gracefully as the sun rises. I believe that if the sun can rise every morning then I can too.
I was born with a rare heart condition known as coarctation of the aorta, which caused myself to undergo open heart surgery four times as a baby. I can’t remember anything, of course, but one thing I knew was that my heart could have decided to suddenly stop beating during any moment of each surgery, just like many other infants. My mind knew differently. My tiny little infant mind knew that I was born to defy any medical condition, I knew I was born to live. This condition makes it difficult for my heart to pump blood around my body due to a narrowed aorta. It may at any time narrow further, meaning the blood will stop pumping around my body and in turn cause complete heart failure.
I am so very grateful that I have had the wonderful chance to live beyond my first heartbeat, that was expected to be my last and write this story for the rest of the world. I suppose that you are wondering how exactly my heart can continuously beat, even when my medical predictions believe it shouldn’t be? In my opinion (even though I am not a biochemist) I would believe that it is not complex, confusing, obscure or anything in between. It is simply having positive affirmations towards everything that I have been told, they say that I could have complete heart failure any moment now, but they said that to my mother the moment I was born, so why should I worry about that 15 years later? I have lived the best 15 years I could possibly imagine, I have lived every second as though it could’ve been my last and I still do to this very day because I know that it will come to a time when I inhale my last breath of life, my heart will beat for the last time and all my ambitions will suddenly come to an end. But who said I couldn’t complete those ambitions in heaven?
I wrote this story to prove that no matter your circumstances in life you have no reason to not live each and every moment to the absolute fullest.