My Hospital Story

By Nell Choi

My Hospital Story shares a nine-year-old girl’s candid perspective of her life when it is turned upside down by a mysterious illness. After years of playing lacrosse and skiing, she is suddenly in the hospital ICU battling a rare disease. She details her raw emotions in journal entries with insight and humor. Despite the struggles and darkness in her journey, she encounters people or “angels” that help light her path to recovery. Through this experience she discovers that compassion from others can be the source of true healing.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press
• Release date: Jan 29, 2021
• ISBN: 9781982262853

Nell Choi

Nell Choi is a middle school student and a big fan of baking macarons and roasting marshmallows around a firepit with her family and friends. She loves cats and dogs and playing lacrosse. My Hospital Story is her first book, inspired by her experience in the hospital after being diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease. By openly sharing her experiences, she hopes to create a supportive community where others can find strength in telling their stories of struggle and discovery.

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Copyright © 2021 Nell Choi.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by

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recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system

without the written permission of the author except in the case of

brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author

and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the

publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Balboa Press

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or

links contained in this book may have changed since publication and

may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those

of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher,

and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

The author of this book does not dispense medical advice or prescribe the use

of any technique as a form of treatment for physical, emotional, or medical

problems without the advice of a physician, either directly or indirectly. The

intent of the author is only to offer information of a general nature to help

you in your quest for emotional and spiritual well-being. In the event you use

any of the information in this book for yourself, which is your constitutional

right, the author and the publisher assume no responsibility for your actions.

Cover Design by Nerissa Baroni

ISBN: 978-1-9822-6284-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-6285-3 (e)

Balboa Press rev. date:   01/29/2021

I am donating 100% of the proceeds from the sales of this book to the Neurohospitalist Reasearch Fund SPF 44526 at Children’s National Hospital. This fund will advance research and care for patients with neuroinflammatory/neuroimmune conditions, including NMOSD (neuromyelitis optica spectrum disease).

I

dedicate this book to Ms. Helen Poon, for her

amazing courage and making everything fun.

When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person that walked in.

That’s what the storm is all about.

—Haruki Murakami

This is a note written to me by my older brother,

Jake, when he was thirteen years old:

ChoiLetter.tiff

CONTENTS

Introduction

Day 1: I Enter the Storm

Week 1: The Whiteboard

Week 2: Torture Devices

Week 3, Day 1: Distinguished Honor Roll

Week 3, Day 2: Learning to Brush Again

Week 3, Day 3: Costume Party?

Week 3, Day 5: Teaching Love

Week 3, Day 6: Cornhole!

Week 4, Day 1: Feeling Normal Again

Week 4, Day 2: Dogs and Art

Week 4, Day 3: Best Milkshake Ever

Week 4, Day 5: Mighty Mom Saves the Day!

Epilogue

Why I Wrote This Book

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Have you ever felt like your life was suddenly taken away from you, and you were banished and trapped in another world? Well, I have. My name is Nell, and I’m twelve years old. A few years ago in February 2018, I was in the hospital for nearly a month. I was nine then. It all happened very suddenly—the sickness, I mean. In early January, I was loving life: skiing in Steamboat, Colorado, with my family; gliding down fluffy white snow mountains with my big brother Jake; and then sipping hot chocolate on a big soft couch in front of a warm, crackling fireplace in the lodge.

Then bam! When I got back home, I developed a mysterious sickness with belly pain and nausea, which we all thought was the flu—until we knew it wasn’t.

My symptoms weren’t getting better, and I even started to develop weirder symptoms, like dizziness and extreme fatigue. I seriously wanted to sleep all the time. I finally went to the emergency room, where doctors discovered through an MRI inflammation in my brain, and quite a lot of it, which they diagnosed as a rare autoimmune disease. That discovery was the start of my long hospital experience. Who would