I Can't Fix You

Hello Humans! I'm going to write about something that's a part of myself. Literally. I'm going to talk about the literal hole that was filled 16 years ago. I used to get embarrassed by it, saying I had a hole in my heart, and got it filled by an experimental surgery that didn't involve ripping the chest open. One that promised a normal life for a small child with her whole life ahead of her. I can now today say that I am proud of me helping to pioneer the new technology that has helped so many people, both young and old, male, female and other, have normal lives without any complications other than an ECG/EKG every 5 to 10 years.

I've done a post about this before, but I will re-iterate. When I was born, I had a hole in my heart between my ventricle and aorta. My parents took me in, and the doctor started noticing it when I was around 3 or 4. My parents had two options: give me the standard open heart surgery, or try a new experimental procedure. After many thoughts, prayers and fasting, they decided on the experimental procedure. So, I went to the hospital when I was 4 for my heart surgery. I remember two things from that day, looking at the fish in the waiting room with my Granddad, and throwing up after they gave me the sleeping medicine, which caused me to take it again. I was prepped for surgery, and put to sleep. Once the doctors put me to sleep, they realized they had the wrong size helix occluder, which is the device that they use to fill the hole. It was a tender mercy, especially to my worried parents, that a sales man happened to visit Primary Children's Hospital and he was carrying the exact size I needed. They went and performed the surgery, which involved sticking the helix occluder through an vein in my leg. They used a scope to help them guide the helix occluder up the vein and into my heart. Once they had positioned the helix occluder, they blew it up like a balloon, and it snapped into place, and surgery was done. You can google a video of it, it's actually really cool how it works. The helix occluder is made up of titanium, which gave my heart the framework it needed for my body's tissue to grow back around it correctly, and fill the hole.

It apparently worked really well, because the day I came home from the hospital, I was running around the house and jumping on my parents bed.

It was never a huge worry to me when I did anything active, because I just felt like a normal kid. Except, I hated to mention it in fear that I would get made fun of or left out. My cousin actually did made fun of me for it, insulting me by saying, "well at least I don't have a metal heart!" one day during a childhood argument. I brushed it aside, forgot about it, except when I had my visits back to Primary Children's for my check up. Every time I got a sticky-lizard to go on my wall, and a pass to continue living my life.

I nearly forgot about my metal heart until I fell in love with Iron Man and started to call myself "Iron Man." I realized that he had a broken heart, which had metal in it, and so did I. But I still never mentioned it to anyone.

At my last check-up back at Primary Children's Hospital, which was nearly 2 years ago, my heart Doctor drew me up a quick picture of the exact procedure, told me to get an ECG/EKG every 5 to 10 years, and said, "You are cleared to go and live a normal life. Thank you for pioneering this technology which has helped so many people live a normal life." I was in the middle of my teenage angst so I thought little of it. But today, that statement means a lot.

When I went to the pool for my first Scuba lesson, I realized that I had a medical condition, which was the titanium in my heart. I mean, I trust my heart with my life, but I wasn't sure if the titanium would withstand the pressure of water like the rest of my body does. I actually googled and found a scientific paper on how much pressure titanium can withstand, and it is a TON. Like in the thousands of atmospheres. I felt better, but was still nervous. It was yesterday during our dive, when I realized that I was doing things that I wouldn't have been able to do had I had open-heart surgery. I was on the bottom of the ocean floor, underneath 3-4 atmospheres of pressure, which is a lot more than it sounds, trust me, and I had no complications. It was when I was kneeling on the ocean floor, looking upwards, following my trail of bubbles to the surface when this realization came to mind.

I was able to breath like a normal human, my heart was pumping like a normal human, and I was living life like a normal human. Except I'm not a normal human. You know the part of Iron Man 3 where he says, "You can take away my house, all my tricks and toys. One thing you can't take away... I am Iron Man," well, that's how I feel right now. This is something no one can take away from me, is my perfect not-normal metal heart and it's impact on not only my life, but the lives of so many others.

A lot of my life has been me wishing. Me wishing that I lived somewhere else, me wishing I was cool or had a boyfriend, or me wishing that I was normal. Well, maybe I wasn't born to have any of those things. Maybe it wasn't my purpose to be like everyone else. Now I look back on my life and love it. I love that I'm not normal. Because of my abnormality, I have already started to change the world, and boy, I am just getting started. It's always the abnormal people, the people who are different, think different, or do things different that end up changing the world. So I like not being normal, and I don't want to fix myself anymore. I'm done trying to fix myself, because I can't. There's nothing to fix, and I am just now seeing that.

"I've been trying for so long to sing you the right song, to show you something different everyday, so you hear what I have to say, like puzzle pieces. And now we're here at a standstill. I'm wondering if you feel the kind of pain that puts your insides out. That's something I know all about, shocking ain't it? Is it because I can't be her? Made your mistakes and make me hurt, I can't fix you. Is it because I can' be her? Made me awake, then make me hurt, I can't fix you. I can feel my heart breaking, the mistakes I've been making. I'm running out of patients to pretend. This isn't how I'll let it end, the feeling fading. You've been mourning your loss here and that's grinding my gears. How can a human lose their self-control? There's nothing else to make you whole, I'm done explaining. Is it because I can't be her? Made your mistakes, and make me hurt, I can't fix you. Is it because I can't be her? Made me awake, then make me hurt, I can't fix you. This is what happens when you leave it to somebody else. If you want it done right you should just do it yourself. You oversaturate your world with nothing but machines. You might make everyone happy, but you're dead inside just like me. And now we're here at a standstill, I wonder if you feel the kind of pain that puts your insides out. That's something I know all about, shocking ain't it? We have a lot more in common than you would be calm with. It's like we're the same person, me and you. We both don't know what we can do. Is it because I can't be her? Made your mistakes and make me hurt, I can't fix you. Is it because I can't be her? Made me awake and make me hurt, I can't fix you."

In the end, I could tried my hardest to fix myself, to make me normal, but there was nothing to fix. I'm just not normal. So past self, I can't fix you, and I'm fine with that. And there is one thing that no one can take away from me... I am Iron Man. Stay wild, flower child.