Page 3 of Fortuity

“Oh my goodness,” she breathed. “Are you telling me your foster mother knew you were sick with the same symptoms as her son, ignored your illness even though she took him to the doctor, and then bothered to get you treatment only when the other kids came down withittoo?”

In the face of her mounting anger, I just nodded my head. At my confirmation, she jumped out of her chair and began to pace the room. The doctor and I watched her for a moment before he interrupted her as she mumbled under herbreath.

“I know there’s a lot going on here, but we need to discuss Faith’s medical needs sooner rather thanlater.”

“What kind of medical needs?” I asked as Miss Stevens came to sit beside meagain.

“I’d like to run some blood work to look for the antibodies to a substance produced by the bacterium that caused your bout of strep throat, check some of your levels, and do a urinalysis,” heexplained.

“Okay,” I replied since that didn’t sound too bad even though I didn’t understanditall.

“You’ll also need a couple of medications. An antibiotic to make sure we get all the infection out of your system, and I want to put you on a diuretic to help with the edema as well as a blood pressure medication since yours is high,” hecontinued.

“Oh,” I sighed. That sounded like a lot of different pills for me to keeptrackof.

“I’ll make sure she gets the prescriptions filled and we have a plan in place to make sure she gets anything else she needs,” Miss Stevens said. “Is there anything else we needtodo?”

“Limit her salt intake and call me immediately if she has decreased urine output or any new symptomsdevelop.”

Although my head was spinning, I didn’t miss the mention of new symptoms. “Likewhat?”

“At this point, I want you to call me with anything unusual,” he answered vaguely. “And I have to admit that I’m leaning towardshospitalizingher.”

“Hospitalizing me?” Irepeated.

“Usually post-strep GM can be cleared up in several weeks to a few months,” he clarified. “But that’s only if you receive the proper care for it. Considering the circumstances that brought you here today, I have some serious concerns about the type of support you’ll receiveathome.”

“I’ve been taking care of myself for a long time, Doc,” I jokedweakly.

“I don’t want to scare you any more than you already are, but you need to fully understand your condition,” he said, taking a deep breath before looking at me with resignation in his eyes. “In a small number of patients, post-strep GM may get worse and lead to chronic kidney failure. Sometimes it can progress to end-stage kidney disease, which would require dialysis and a kidneytransplant.”

I’d spent years convinced I lived without hope. It took hearing those words to understand I wasn’t as hopeless as I thought I had been. Or at least I hadn’t been. Until that very moment, I was more similar to other teenagers than I ever would have admitted in that I thought I would have a long and fairly healthy life. I didn’t smoke, drink, or do drugs—not after the way I had watched my mom destroy herself. Apparently, none of that mattered because a common childhood illness that could be easily treated with antibiotics had managed to become a possible death sentenceforme.

In the following weeks, I discovered how low I could fall as my condition didn’t improve. It didn’t matter that Miss Stevens had all the kids pulled from the foster home where I had been staying or that she finally found one of the few nice ones for me to go to with a foster mother who really acted like a mom and treated me as though I was her own. She cared for me as the swelling got worse, my blood pressure shot through the roof, and my appetitedisappeared.

When the time came for me to be admitted to the hospital, she visited almost daily for the first few weeks until there was another foster child who needed her to be home so she could properly care for them. Saying goodbye to her was one of the hardest things I had ever done because I’d come to care for her. It was impossible not to when she’d shown me such compassion, but I knew there were others who needed her more than I did since I had nurses and personal care attendants watching over me around theclock.

Kids came and went through the pediatric unit. Some of them even tried to befriend me before I got a reputation for being a loner. But with everything going on, I was even more closed off than usual. Trying to focus on anything but how sick I had gotten, I threw myself into my online courses in the hope that I’d be able to keep up with my studies so that I wouldn’t have to repeat my senior year. As my condition continued to worsen, I worked even harder on my classes because I was suddenly obsessed with the idea that I wanted to at least graduate high school beforeIdied.

They monitored everything about me on a regular basis, and I felt like studying was the only thing over which I had control right now. I couldn’t eat what or how much I wanted because the doctors wanted to reduce the buildup of toxins that my kidneys would normally remove. My fluid intake was closely monitored so that I only drank the same amount I could pee. They brought me pills and took my vitals around the clock. But study time? That was all me. I could even turn on the laptop they’d provided and read to my heart’s content. Nobody ever tried to tell me I couldn’t...probably because they all knew I was on my way towardsdeath’sdoor.

When they first put me on dialysis, I felt better and started to think I could beat this thing. It was only supposed to be used for the short-term, but I was one of the unlucky ones because my kidney damage was so great that they thought dialysis may be permanently needed. That’s when they started talking about a transplant. If I had any family who gave a damn, they would have tried to do a live donation. My rare blood type made me a difficult match, and being a foster kid only complicated itfurther.

I became obsessed with making the UNOS waiting list, even though there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to influence their decision to list me. Or to put me high enough up that I even had a remote chance of getting the kidney I so desperately needed. When the day finally came and I was told I made the list, it hit me. In order for me to live, someone else mustfirstdie.

Although a part of me celebrated the fact that my chances of survival had at least slightly improved that day, I felt morbid. It was like I was wishing death upon another person. As though I was hoping to swap fates with them, even though I’d never want anyone else to have the crap luck I’d lived with allmylife.

Then it was just a waiting game, watching my place on the list rise and fall depending on the results of my newest labs. Each of us were ranked by UNOS using a point system. It also took a number of other factors into consideration, including the degree of match between us and the donor and the length of time we had been on the waiting list. My place never went high enough for me to get my hopes up, though. The doctors knew I was a bad bet since I had no support system in place to help me after the transplant, and sodidI.

The dialysis continued, but I knew I was getting worse and the day was drawing closer when I was going to run out of options. It was painfully obvious to everyone that I was starting to accept my fate, starting to believe the call would never come. Not for me. That’s when the nurses started up the faith jokes—to try and raise my spirits and get me focused on staying as healthy as I could while I waited. And waited. And waitedsomemore.

During all that time, I knuckled down and plowed through my school work like it was the one thing that could save my life. Although I knew I wasn’t going to be able to return to school to finish my senior year, I wasn’t willing to completely give up until I finished all my courses and knew I had accomplished something my mother had not. I worked towards my graduation with a desperation that meant I finished months before the school year ended. When I clicked the mouse to shut out the program, all my tests finished and papers completed, I finally felt like I couldletgo.

That was the day my luck changed. Somehow, a miracle happened. I was given a second chance. One I promised myself I wouldn’twaste.

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