Christina Benavides, Staff Writer
December 8, 2011
Filed under Features, Top Stories
Jaimie Thibodeau enjoys her school day walking to class, taking notes, and chatting to friends in the hallway. She goes to the mall on Fridays and hangs out at her friend’s house on Saturdays. She’s doing so well that, if not for the occasional chest pain, no one would remember how close to death Thibodeau had been just a month ago.
“Its wonderful to see all my friends again,” Thibodeau said. “I’m doing my best.”
While her friends were celebrating Homecoming and her 18th birthday was approaching, Thibodeau was in a hospital fighting for her life.
“I didn’t think I’d be out of the isolation room until March,” Thibodeau said. “ I was very scared.”
Thibodeau was born with a heart condition named Hypo Plastic left Heart Syndrome, which means that Thibodeau has half a heart. Thibodeau was born with this condition. She’s visited the hospital twice because of her disease, once when she was a year old and again when she was 10 years old in 2005.
“The only time I can remember was when I was 10 years old and I was scared,” Thibodeau said.
When she was 10, she got an internal pacemaker installed into her heart. The device made sure her heart was still beating. Having it in her was an inconvenience, but it was nothing compared to having to stay in the hospital, stuck on a hard bed in a colorless, dull room for the rest of her life. With an internal pacemaker, she could be mobile and try to act like a normal teen even if she was careful and a bit frail.
Thibodeau was relentlessly positive toward her school-life. Her teachers were aware about her tenuous condition, and had been trained and instructed on how to react if she complained of heart/chest pains.
“Ever since she was enrolled teachers have known that there are risks,” Michael Fore, her math teacher of two years, said. “ It’s on Infinite Campus so teachers are aware.”
Fore was teaching the day Thibodeau was admitted into the hospital. Although she had had a few episodes in his class before, Mr. Fore could see that Thibodeau was sicker than ever. Convinced that something was seriously wrong with her, he personally escorted her to the nurse.
“She turned purple and her hand was going numb,” Fore said. “I had her last year, and it’s happened before, but this time she was really weak, and I told her that I was going to help her to the nurse because she was obviously unwell. She kept insisting to go alone, but I told her, ‘You can’t go alone’.”
School nurse Christy Silvas, R.N. confirmed that Thibodeau was critically unwell. They called her mother, had her dad pick her up and took her to the doctor who later sent her to the Children’s Medical Center in Dallas.
“The internal pacemaker monitors her heart pulses and sends in electrical currents into the heart muscles to jolt her if it stops beating,” Silvas said. “As she grows they have to put in a new pacemaker because it will grow old.”
Thibodeau’s doctors in the hospital discovered that Thibodeau’s internal pacemaker had stopped working. It had grown old and the electrical wires attached to her heart had detached.
All of Thibodeau’s friends and teachers were concerned for her. They would stop in hallways and ask for updates over her condition. Some teachers, like Keli Cullen and Fore, even had their students make Thibodeau get-well, and happy birthday cards and posters. On Homecoming night, which was Thibodeau’s 18th birthday, Fore personally brought the cards to Thibodeau.
“I brought the cards down to her and told her who had won Homecoming and she was excited to know,” Fore said. “She told me to keep her updated.”
Marissa Rubio and Megan Garza are both really close friends of Jaimie. They were completely devastated with Thibodeau’s predicament. Garza remembers bursting into tears in her classes and Rubio admits tearing up countless times a day.
“I’m basically her younger sister,” Rubio said. “It’s hard not having her at school. And I know there are some people who don’t like her, but if they could all put that aside right now, she really needs your help, and it’s not the time to make jokes. Put yourself in her shoes, how would you feel?”
Rubio tried to visit her everyday in the hospital. But Thibodeau’s most recent trip to the hospital was looking bleak.
“This is the first time I’ve been through something like this,” Rubio said. “It was scary. I had noticed that her heart was hurting during some football games and I knew she visited the nurse’s office a lot but it kills me that I can’t spend so much time with her as I used to.”
Ms. Silvas made sure to be up to date on anything related to Thibodeau. She was anxious about Thibodeau’s health.
Things were not looking up for Thibodeau. If she wanted to leave the hospital she’d have to consent to surgery. But surgeons were hesitant to operate on her, due to her weak heart. They advised her to get a heart transplant, so that when they did do surgery on her, they could be sure that her heart would continue to beat.
“Her heart over the last eighteen years has become weakened,” Silvas said. “The cardiologists are afraid that if they go to do the operation to put in a new pacemaker, it’ll kill her. They put her on a transplant list so that they can have a good heart to keep her alive.”
After they found out that they would be unable to receive the transplant, Thibodeau and her parents were left with a very difficult decision. They had three options: they could go home and get another opinion, they could go ahead with the surgery Thibodeau had done before or they could try a newer surgery the doctor suggested and pray Thibodeau’s heart would keep beating. Although Thibodeau’s parents wanted to keep searching for better odds, Thibodeau wished to just go through with the surgery she had done before. The doctor insisted that the newer operation would be risky but more secure than their other options.
“I had gone through this procedure once before, and at the time it seemed like the safest option,” Thibodeau said.
In the end, Thibodeau’s parents and Jaimie agreed to doctor’s decision and let her go through the newer surgery. On Oct. 19 at 12:30 p.m., Thibodeau entered the emergency room to save her life.
“I was very relieved,” Thibodeau said. “ I’m alive and I can see all of my friends again.”
With the pacemaker safely installed and her heart beating soundly, Thibodeau was finally on her road to recovery. Her friends and family could breathe in relief, and cry with joy.
“I knew that the longer the surgery lasted, the more they were doing to help her.” Garza said. “I was just happy she was okay.”
Thibodeau’s surgery had lasted 12 hours. It had taken longer than planned and was an overall nerve-racking experience for everyone involved.
“I love her to death,” Rubio said. “She’s so excited to come back to Summit but I personally think she needs to rest. I’m making her a CD and other surprises.”
Thibodeau came back to school on Oct. 24. She was ordered to take things slow, and be mindful of her fragile state. She used a wheelchair for a couple weeks until she regained her health.
“I really don’t like the wheelchair,” Thibodeau said. “But I’m very happy to be back in Summit and the wheelchair is worth being here.”
She came back a week earlier than anyone wanted her to, but she insisted on coming back as soon as possible. She is going to be featured in a medical study because of her surgery. It was so new that her surgery’s success has to be noted. This whole experience might repeat itself one day, but this time Thibodeau has overcome it. She thanks her ‘personal support family’, Rachel Hayes, Heather Martinez, Rubio and Garza. But she’s especially grateful to Summit students and teachers who thought of her while she was in trouble.
“The cards and Summit love at the hospital made it all bearable,” Thibodeau said.
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