Connor Randall has a heart. After all, he is human and, like all humans, he needs that oxygen-enriched blood that the heart so graciously pumps through the body. Yet, unlike most humans, Connor is extremely lucky to have a heart.
When Connor was only three months old, he was diagnosed with Cardiomyopathy. Simply put, Connor’s heart muscle was underdeveloped and had not grown at the same rate as the rest of his body. So, he was put on the list for a heart transplant.
Three months later, Connor received a successful heart transplant at Children’s Hospital in Denver.
For 11 years, Connor lived life like every other child. He was on medications and had occasional doctor visits to ensure that his ticker was ticking correctly, but the transplant had relatively little effect on Connor’s life.
But on July 4, 2003, Connor woke up and fainted. He was rushed to the hospital, but was sent home with instructions to have him drink more water; he was probably dehydrated. Four days later, Connor fainted again.
Once more, Connor was rushed to the hospital, where they took an emergency cardio catheterization and found that his body was rejecting the heart through Coronary Artery Disease.
“Basically what happens is the brain recognizes the heart as a foreign object and sends the immune system to attack it,” Connor said. “It’s like attacking yourself and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
The only response in situations like these is immune suppression medications, which Connor had already been taking. So, the hospital started treatments and Connor was in and out of the hospital practically nonsto
p for one-and-a-half years.
Almost one year later, Connor was put on the re-transplant list as a sort of last resort. The doctors had tried everything else.
“Basically, it was at the point where I probably had a week left to live in the summer of 2005,” Connor said. “I was so sick I couldn’t walk up stairs without getting out of breath, I was freezing cold all the time…I lost a lot of weight and I had pick lines in my arm permanently feeding medicine directly into my heart.”
On July 18, 2005, at three o’clock in the morning, Connor’ family received a call about the transplant. Connor went in for surgery.
Though he doesn’t remember the surgery (he was knocked out), Connor does remember some parts of that morning. “I remember walking in. They wanted to wheelchair me, but I wouldn’t let them do that, so I walked in with the nurses, turned around and gave them [my family] the thumbs up. Then I laid myself down,” Connor said.
The surgery was a success. Nine days later, Connor was released. He continued to have treatments to ensure that the transplant remained successful and to avoid rejection from the body.
In December 2007, Connor had another cardio catheterization, which revealed a small amount of rejection. He underwent treatment for four months, during which he missed most of the second semester of his sophomore year. But, in June 2008, after another catheterization, the doctors discovered that the rejection was under control, though not completely gone.
Despite the incredible medical challenges Connor has had to face, he has made a profound impact on the community. For the 11 years between his first transplant and the rejection of that heart, he was a sort of poster child for Children’s Hospital. As one of the nation’s leaders in heart transplants, Children’s relied on Connor, telling other children like him (and their parents) that everything would turn out okay. They could point to Connor and say, “see, his was a success.”
More recently, Connor has worked with State Rep. Sara Gagliardi of Arvada on a bill to lower the blood donation age to 16, with parental consent.
“I was basically the young expert,” Connor said. “It’s estimated that it [lowering the donation age] will increase their donations by 35 percent, just by lowering it down to the sophomore class.”
Connor met with Gagliardi and Bonfils Blood Center and testified before the Health and Human Services committee in the state capital in an effort to get this bill passed.
“It’s important for other students to know how courageous he was to do this and to see what a great difference he was making” Gagliardi said. “He has such an understanding of health and what a difference that can make.”
In addition, Connor is an advocate for organ donation and has been involved in promoting that cause, including appearances on the radio with Slacker and Steve. Since his second transplant in 2005, Connor has made countless speeches at fundraisers of all kinds to promote organ donation.
As if his involvement outside of school, which actually spreads farther than these few causes, isn’t enough, Connor is also active within the Ralston Valley community. He is a member of student government and, until it did not reform this year, the mock trial team. Connor is also a member of the Xpress staff (it is important to note that this had no influence on the judging committee’s decision).
Connor has faced trials. He has had a total of three hearts in seventeen years of existence. He, at one point in his life, became so sick that he had perhaps just one week left. Yet, Connor has taken every opportunity to make a difference. He exhibits excellence within the RVHS community, yes, but his impact has rippled outward like a stone thrown into a pond. He promotes blood and organ donation, which directly save lives, and which directly saved his life, and he doesn’t back down, even when the task before him is daunting, because, in Connor’s eyes, a life is worth so much more than a few free moments.