My Complicated Yet Wonderful Life

This is a story about a young girl who was born in 1962 and grew up in a small suburb in Denver, Colorado. She had an older brother and sister and a younger sister. She differed from her siblings in that as a child, she had endless amounts of energy and enthusiasm and wanted to learn and do as much as she could academically and athletically. She was a quick learner and always had high expectations for herself, not to be a show-off but to prove to herself that she could do it.She preferred to play sports with her brother, who was six years older than her, and he was not afraid to show her some of the hard knocks of playing football or baseball. She was willing to take whatever it took to be able to play. When she was four years old, her mother had taken her grandmother to visit a friend. While they waited, her mother taught her to memorize the Pledge of Allegiance. She loved to learn and could not wait to go to school.In elementary school, she had a wonderful first-grade teacher who taught her and other children reading skills that allowed them to read at higher levels. By second grade, they were all reading at the seventh-grade level. As she went through elementary school, she would be studying in all subjects the higher level of courses.As she entered junior high school, she knew that the classes would be more difficult and that there would be a lot more homework. She was able to keep up with the work, and in the fall, she signed up for the basketball team. She loved playing at a higher level and meeting some new friends. By Christmastime, she began to have less energy and noticed that she was a little more tired than usual. As spring approached, she signed up for the track team. She was never much of a runner, but she thought it would help her get in shape. Over spring break, she would try and practice running 100-yard dashes and would notice how difficult it was and how tired it would make her. She participated in most of the track meets and, toward the end of April, started developing an open sore on her right forearm. Early in May, her fatigue was getting worse. The sore on her arm was not healing, and she began running a fever. She would miss over two weeks of school, and one day, her fever went up to 105 degrees, and they took her to the doctor, who gave her a shot of penicillin. It slowly brought the temperature down to 101-102. The sore on her arm continued to get worse, and her level of endurance kept going down. On Friday, her mom had her go back to school, even though her temperature was still 101 degrees, and she wrapped her arm up. Her mom, who worked for a doctor, picked her up from school and took her to have blood drawn. She would go to work with her mom on Monday, and he would have the results of the blood work and examine her. She had no idea about what she was about to find out or what would lie ahead of her.

-- Terri Spitzer