Sunday, 5 March 2017

Never Lived to See Tomorrow.....An Unexpected Fate by Raquel Mills





I am a YouTube fan and over the past three and a half years, I have followed my favorite YouTube channel called Bratayley. From the onset, they seem to be a normal adventurous family of five- two parents-Billy and Katie with three energetic children- Caleb (their only son), and two daughters (Annie and Hayley).


From the time I encountered their channel, this joyous family of five has grown in my heart. Their vlogs always turned my dark days into a sunny ones-they were my strength and comfort.

October 1st, 2015, is a day that I will never forget, the day when I seemed to have lost a piece of my strength.



This is Caleb, a happy, carefree and adventurous individual who told the most amazing, epic jokes which brightened my day. The thirteen years of life which he lived on earth, he had no medical history of diseases. There wasn’t a point in his life there was any sign that some strange changes  were occurring within his body. This was a perfectly, blessed boy living a normal life.

However, something unexpected and peculiar occurred which changed EVERYTHING






Now, these are images from the vlog of September 30th, 2015, one day before the tragic and unfortunate event occurred. This is Caleb again at the breakfast table…he just woke up from bed, looking all drowsy and sleep eyed…..a normal and natural phenomena for anyone who is just waking up from bed…right?

Little did Caleb’s family know that these normal occurrences for any individual waking up in the morning were indications that Caleb was slowly dying. September 30th, 2015, continued like a normal day for the Bratayleys as after breakfast Caleb regained his usual free-spirited self.

THIS WAS CALEB’S LAST DAY ON EARTH

On October 1st, 2015, Caleb died in his sleep having suffered from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. This came as an unexpected shock to his family…..never had they heard anyone in their family suffer from this kind of disease, so how could it have taken their son’s life? Investigations show that hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, is just as the name implies. It is the excessive growth and enlargement of the heart muscle cells which causes the walls of the ventricle, particularly the left ventricle to thicken. This thickening of the left ventricle blocks the blood flow out of the heart to the rest of the body.
From A&P class, we learnt that the left ventricle is thicker than the right since it is responsible for transporting this high volume and pressure of blood away from the heart to the rest of the body organs. However, the excessive thickness, as in poor Caleb’s case not only damages the heart’s muscle cells but disrupts the heart’s electrical signals.


This is a very rare and uncommon disease with no associated signs and symptoms. Research indicates that individuals living with HCM, their lives are not affected and the disease can go undetected like in the case of Caleb. This disease can affect anyone of any particular age, and therefore it claimed the life of an innocent thirteen year old boy. Upon further investigations after Caleb’s death, it was found that the disease runs on Caleb’s mom side of the family and it is genetic as there is a change in the genes in the heart muscle proteins.

Almost two years later, I still remember the death of Caleb…..It just goes to show that life can take an unexpected twist, one is never sure of their last day on earth. Before, without any in depth knowledge about the heart and diseases I always thought inwardly that this disease was a fairy tale and some fictitious disease. With the knowledge I have gained now in A&P class, I am now able to explain the disease and thus share this story.

It will never be the same without Caleb in the vlogs, but the Bratayleys and I live by this motto #CELEBRATELIFE.




 

1 comment:

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    About two years ago, when I was 56, I started feeling foggy and had occasional memory lapses. My wife, Mary, started to notice it, too, but I also have hearing issues so she thought that was the problem. My memory worsened very gradually over the years, and we lived with it, compensating as needed. I became less social. After some months thereafter, it got to the point where we couldn’t keep making excuses or ignoring it. I had gone from doing our grocery shopping without a list to going with a list, to having the list but not buying what was on it.

    Mary went online to do some research, and it was during this process we had been fortunate enough to come across Dr. Utu Herbal Cure: an African herbalist and witch doctor whose professional works had majored on the eradication of certain viral conditions, especially dementia, ( improving the memory capacity positively), via a traditional, naturopathic process and distinguished diet plan. It was by the administration of this herbal specialist that I had been able to improve my condition for better. So to say, the encounter with the above-mentioned herbal practitioner was the first time we ever heard there was something that possibly can be done to improve my memory functionality.

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