Personal Narrative: Dr. Bill Neches Heart Camp

When I was a few weeks old, my parents realized that I was not normal. I would not drink my bottle and I seemed to have a blue tint around my lips. Concerned, my parents took their precious firstborn to the hospital, where the doctors made a discovery that transformed not only my life, but the lives of everyone. What my family learned on this dramatic day was that I was born with heart disease. Normal hearts have four chambers, however mine is different: my right ventricle, which pumps deoxygenated blood to the lungs, is too little to function correctly. The ventricle is so minuscule that it is considered missing. The great arteries in my heart were flipped, and there is a hole between my left and partial right ventricle. In almost eighteen …show more content…
Bill Neches Heart Camp for Kids has not only helped transform me into a better leader, but it has aided me in further connecting to my future career pathway. Heart Camp, as most refer to it, is a weeklong sleep away camp for children ages eight and up who are living with congenital heart disease. The goal of the camp is to have children with severe disabilities connect to others who face similar challenges in their everyday lives. At the age of eight, my parents sent me away to Heart Camp, and I have attended each summer since. When I turned sixteen, I became a junior counselor and worked with the Children’s Hospital staff to create a paramount week of camp for all the children attending. Furthermore, as a leader, I stepped up to the plate and created my own program called “Heart Camp Survivor” that ran the whole week. Running this project allowed me to work with many doctors and nurses side-by-side whom I had never noticed attended camp before. In addition, as I was working with the staff, I learned many things about hospital careers that I never knew before. The wisdom I gained from the employees of Dr. Bill Neches Heart Camp for Kids about nursing highly influenced my decision to study the field in …show more content…
I am excited to begin a fresh chapter of my life. As a nursing student, I hope Duquesne helps me first learn the basics of nursing, and subsequently provide various opportunities to work with patients in the city of Pittsburgh. However, I do not want my entire class schedule to be filled with only nursing classes: I wish to have a varied learning experience where I can meet others who study other majors. I recognize there are countless opportunities to become involved and I want to be able to balance my school work and these extra-curricular activities to the best of my ability. I also seek to continue to worship at a church each Sunday and participate in some sort of youth group found around or inside university grounds. There is a fire inside of me that is ready to set ablaze and the only item needed is a match to create a spark. Duquesne is that