Meet the 2024 Scholars

"Describe a defining moment in your journey with CF that sparked personal growth or resilience. How did this experience affect you and what did you learn from this moment?"

Spring 2016, I felt on top of the world. The weather was warming up, summer break was on the horizon, baseball season was coming up, and CF was the last thing on my mind. This wasn't to say CF wasn't a huge part of my life, just that working hard to stay healthy was second nature to me. It has always just been part of my daily routine. As I headed into a quarterly check-up at my pediatric CF clinic, I wasn't nervous. I'm used to check-ups, medicines, and treatments. I went through my annual labs and chest X-Ray, and then went up to the exam rooms to wait for the nurse practitioner. After waiting for a few minutes I heard a knock on the door. The nurse practitioner entered with a slightly furrowed brow. My heart began to race. The thoughts in my head began to swirl. One of my biggest fears has always been CF restricting me from living my life to the fullest. I have never been hospitalized, and other than the occasional antibiotic treatment for a minor infection I have never really gotten that sick. The nurse practitioner sat down and displayed the images from my chest x-ray on the screen. She then proceeded to show me on the x-ray that there was some scarring on my lungs. I felt like I was going to pass out. I had never really experienced anything out of the ordinary at any of my appointments, so this was uncharted territory for me. The NP proceeded to tell me that it wasn't super serious and that it is just something we need to keep an eye on. At the end of my appointment I was holding back tears. I felt utterly defeated. I have always worked so hard to stay healthy, only missing a couple of treatments EVER, making sure to take all of my medications, how could this happen? Nothing is promised. No matter how hard you work there are always going to be things that are out of your control. I realized that I could do everything right and things could still end up going wrong. Instead of letting this drag me down, I decided that I was going to keep working as hard as I can to stay healthy. Since then, I have still never been hospitalized and haven't had any significant additional scarring in my lungs. I know that I can only control what I can control, and I have still been enjoying life to the fullest and working hard to keep myself healthy.