*This article is transcribed from an interview. To protect the privacy of the interviewee, names have been changed.
My name is Tyler and I am 19 years old. On the outside, I am a normal happy-go-lucky kid in need of a haircut. But for the past ten years, I have been struggling with a chronic illness that has forced me to change the way I live. This is my story.
I was born and raised into a family of athletes. My brother is a goalie for a local hockey team, and my dad nearly pursued a career in professional sports. The walls of my room are adorned with trophies, monuments of my past.
Hockey, soccer, baseball, volleyball, badminton, ultimate frisbee and distance running —I did it all. . Sports were a major part of my life, but when I was eleven years old that all changed. I fainted for the first time while playing sports.
My ears began to ring, my vision was reduced to a pinhole, my body temperature rose and I started to slur my words. My coach pulled me out of the game, and my parents and I chalked it up to pushing myself too hard, as the symptoms resembled heat stroke.
Over the next few years, the fainting continued and I had to slowly drop out of the sports I played my whole life. From the 7th to the 9th grade I withdrew into myself. I cut off contact with my sports friends, as I could no longer relate to them.
I don’t believe in letting a disease win, and so I never got an official diagnosis; but, I knew I was depressed. For the next four years I bounced from specialist to specialist being ogled and examined by interns and doctors who each had their own hunches.
I went to a neurologist, but the results came up clean. I went to a cardiologist, who used my previous medical history of rheumatic fever and a phantom heart murmur (which would later be debunked by other specialists) to conclude that I had rheumatic heart disease.
It wasn’t until I was fifteen when things started to change for me. I replaced playing sports with playing music, something my illness didn’t stop me from enjoying. My band friends became my support circle.
But most importantly, I got an accurate diagnosis. Vasovagal syncope, a disorder which causes the patient to suffer severe drops in blood pressure and heart rate if exposed to extreme stimulus (pain, heat, cold). I don’t think I realized what it meant, I just thought I was sick and would pick it up again in a week.
Though there are treatments and tools that can help avoid triggers, there is no known cure, and no medication to control vasovagal syncope. There is very little medical literature about it. The doctor told me to cut my activity level from 60 to 0. In other words, the prescription was no sports. I took a tablespoon of salt twice a day, which was not a long-term solution, to increase my blood pressure in case of a hypotensive attack
While this medical anomaly should have left me stumped, I chose to not let the disease control my life. From ages 15 to 19, I started on the long path to rebuilding my life and being happy again.
I have re-introduced myself to various sports after years of suffering from the disease. I make an effort to ensure I am aware of  when I am pushing too hard. I will continue to push the limits in a safe manner and live as normally as I can.
The illness has allowed me to take a step back and stop taking things for granted. My experiences with the cardiologist, looking at the EKGs and the CAT scans and the ability of the doctor to give me the diagnosis no one else could, inspired me to pursue a career in cardiology.
I am 19 years old, and don’t claim to be an expert. But, here are a few words of advice to anyone struggling with illness, mental health, and identity: Find your limits, but don’t give up on who you are. You are bigger than whatever is trying to bring you down.
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