Today I met Camila in Hayward with Miranda. I met Camila at transplant camp in 2019. She reached out to me on IG and I am so happy she did because Oh my gosh! Am I so happy!
We first went to Jollibee and then we got cake at a nearby store. Then we talked in the car and then went to Target. We ended by going to get boba.
I realized how lucky I am to have Camila and Miranda in my life. Of course, Miranda is a blessing. She is my transplant best friend. We have exercised on FaceTime together during the pandemic, celebrated my NYU decision together, and visited Barbara on hospice together. But I have a strong feeling that Camila will also be someone I can call during hard times. She is also someone who had a heart transplant around the same time as me, same hospital as me, and same age as me.
We were walking around Target talking about things. Miranda looked at the baby food and said something about the liquid formulas she had to drink between the times she had the feeding tube in her nose. And Camila said like “yeah, those are disgusting” and I agreed because I also had to drink those nasty ass formulas too! And like… how amazing is it to have all three of us with the same experiences because we absolutely do not relate to 99.99% of the population. I mean, who else can I laugh with about formula and feeding tubes?
Miranda, Camila, me, and another boy named Roque were the “Four Musketeers” in Transplant Camp. I hope Roque is doing well. He’s somewhere near Redding, CA so that’s a three hour drive away. I told Camila we should visit Roque and kick his ass for not visiting us but Camila said he was too far 😩 One day Roque should drive down here so we can kick his ass over here – together!
Camila said we could all write a book. She would have 3 chapters, Miranda would have 3 chapters, and I would have 3 chapters. Miranda said she would need more than 3 chapters. I said the amount of trauma we have between the three of us is absolutely astronomical. It could fill a room!
I also said that we were not done writing our book because there are still pages we need to fill. We have so many pages left and we’re not halfway there yet. Camila is currently experiencing kidney rejection (she had a kidney and heart transplant) for a year now and I don’t know what to feel. I asked Miranda for advice and she said that she thought Camila was fine. Because when you think someone is fine, they are usually fine whereas if you think someone is not fine, they’re usually not fine. I wonder if I should start praying again so that I can pray for Camila. I want Camila to be okay because I need Camila to be okay. She is my fellow warrior and she has not finished writing her book.
I hope Camila doesn’t see this.
