All Charged Up!

All Charged Up!




by
Antonio Enriquez R.-N.
One day in June I could only drink water and apple juice! That day I was going to Children’s Hospital. I was so nervous!
When I was born my heart wasn’t beating right. It was beating too slowly. So when I was five hours old I had a pacemaker put in my body. A pacemaker is a metal, rubber object that changes the speed of the heart. Sometimes it is a little scary going into a room where surgeons open you up like a book. Even though I can’t remember anything about when I was five hours old I’ve been told that when I was that young I had my first surgery. The reason I have to have surgery again is because the pacemaker is a battery that runs out in a certain amount of years.
At two o’clock I hopped into my mom’s minivan to get a new one. I was on my way to the hospital. On my way through Boston I saw millions of cars!
As I passed through the spinning glass doors of Children’s Hospital’s lobby I passed by thousands of people and kids. Then, I climbed up the stairs and entered the waiting room.
“Hi,” everyone said. My step mom, dad, step dad, half sister, half brother, aunt, and grandparents were already there.
It felt like hours until the doctor called, “Antonio.” My parents and I walked toward the room with the doctor. I sadly waved to my family. The room was bright white. It had a white bed. I lay down and the doctor handed me some medicine. It was a smooth, pink liquid. I took it. I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I knew, I was in a different bed in a room with a TV dangling to my left. Also a mini bed on my right was in the room. My parents and another doctor were in front of me.
I opened my mouth to speak but no sound came. I knew why. I had two tubes in my throat that were giving me nutrition. I gestured for a paper and pencil. I had invented a new way to communicate!
If I got this far, I thought, it can’t be hard going forward.