Hi! I'm Tyler. I was born with a disease called Hirschsprungs Disease.
I couldn't poop at all, because my large intestine didn't have any Ganglion cells. Ganglion Cells are what make your intestines get rid of the waste
your body doesn't need. I had surgery when I was 4 days old to remove the intestine that didn't work.
My surgeon, Dr. Malo, gave me an Ileostomy. Everyone thought I was fixed after surgery but I wasn't.
One night when I was about 6 weeks old, I spit up on Mom and woke her up. She decided to check my bag and when she did, it was full of blood! Mom and Dad took me to the hospital right away and we ended up living there for almost two months.
I ended up having 5 blood transfusions because I had an infection
called Enterocolitis, and it was making my intestines bleed a lot.
After weeks of trying to get my intestines to take food,
we finally got to go home! I went home with an IV in my chest called a Central Line. This gave my body all the nutrition it needed until my intestines started to work again.
Two weeks later..... I took a airplane flight for the first time. Mom, Dad and I flew from Seattle to Boston to do a special test, called a Motility Study.
This test showed that I had IND (Intestinal Neuronal Dysplasia)
This meant my small intestine didn't work right either. The doctors weren't too excited about this.
But after a while on TPN (IV Nutrition through the tube in my chest)
slowly my intestine was able to handle a small drip feed
through a tube in my stomach.
When I was three years old, I had surgery to get rid of my bag.
I was was really excited. But in no time, I was sick, with stomach pains and bad infections. My mom even had to do rectal irrigations several times a day.. and I hated that.
So, on February 24th, 2000, I got my bag back. I felt so much better!
No more irrigations or pain.
I was myself again.... Bag and all!!
I'm now 13 years old and in 8th grade.
I still have some problems with infections, and when flu season hits,
but most of the time I'm able to stay away from the hospital.
I can't wait for summer time again because summer means no school and summer camp!
Thanks for reading about me! I hope that you were reminded that God has plans for us that we may not understand....
But He always has a reason!
