11 minute read
Heart of Courage
Against all odds Matthew Villegas arose from living in the shadow of death to living a normal teenage life with friendships and community.
Help Wanted signs were everywhere. Micah Williams, CEO of Georgia Pine Straw, wondered how much longer the Covid-19 pandemic could be blamed for the lack of people to employ. He’d heard it said that the future of American businesses may soon depend on the employer’s willingness to understand the thought process and needs of “Generation Z” and the upcoming “Generation Alpha.” Determined to do more than passively understand and accommodate whatever mindset had resulted from the culture of the day, he answered an email from Paige Williamson, Director of Family Connections, asking for volunteers for a mentor program at Toombs County High School. It was his sign. His opportunity to be a voice, an influence, and to make a difference. In January 2022, Micah became a mentor to TCHS student Matthew Villegas.
Whatever he expected, Matthew was not it. His failing grades had gotten him kicked out of Georgia Cyber Academy, but not for any reason Micah might had imagined. Matthew had just started back to school in person after a seven-year interruption. But any academic encouragement Micah’s young protégé might have needed was not due to a lack of mental acuity or inattentiveness to his studies. It was just that it was a little difficult to stay engaged with online classes while risking cardiac arrest because he made his bed that morning.
Matthew had lived nearly every day of his life in the shadow of death. Born on March 8, 2004, he was three days old when a pediatrician detected a heart murmur. An x-ray at the hospital revealed that his heart was enlarged. He was immediately transported to Savannah, where his parents, Julie (Strickland) and Art (Villegas), learned that their son had mitral valve stenosis.
“Mitral valve stenosis,” according to mayoclinic.org, “… is a narrowing of the valve between the two left heart chambers. The narrowed valve reduces or blocks blood flow into the heart's main pumping chamber.” Doctors in Savannah attempted to widen the valve for blood flow with meds, but the meds were unsuccessful. Matthew was flown to the Children's Healthcare of Atlanta - Egleston Hospital and underwent his first surgery, an angioplasty, to open his arteries. He was six days old.
When Matthew turned three, he had his first open heart surgery to replace his mitral valve with an artificial one. During the surgery, doctors discovered that he also had aortic stenosis. Aortic stenosis means, “The valve between the lower left heart chamber and the body's main artery (aorta) is narrowed and doesn't open fully. This reduces or blocks blood flow from the heart to the aorta and to the rest of the body” (mayoclinic.org).
Once home from the surgery, he began crying incessantly. Julie knew something was wrong. “At first, I thought he might be coming down with a cold, but I went ahead and took him to the doctor.” Her instincts were not only those of a mother but also the training of an LPN. (Julie has worked “off and on” with the Georgia State Prison systems since 2011). “The doctor in Savannah thought fluid was building up in his pericardial sac, so they put Matthew on Lasix. When that didn’t help, he was put on a plane for Egleston and immediately taken into surgery.”
The fluid was actually blood. “He’d been on coumadin, and his blood got too thin,” said Julie. “It was seeping through the stitches into the pericardial sac.” The pericardium, the sac surrounding the heart, had almost ruptured. Had it done so, it would have meant certain death. Julie’s quick thinking saved her son’s life.
Matthew was eight years old when his parents divorced. Even so, both did everything they could to secure him with their love and support. Even though he was Art and Julie’s only child together, he was loved and supported of six older half-brothers and sisters.
Simple things like going to school and playing with friends soon became impossible. Matthew remembered the playground and making up “stories that were all nonsense” with his best friend, Jerry. His mother’s memories of that time are conversely, more distressful. Due to being on blood thinners, he had severe nosebleeds, which caused vomiting. Twice, Matthew was rushed to Savannah to cauterize the inside of his nose, which was the only way to stop the bleeding. “Most days, I’d get a call by 11:00 or 11:30 because of either a nosebleed, vomiting, or shortness of breath,” said Julie. By 5th grade, homeschooling was his only option.
Matthew was ten years old when he had his second open heart surgery to replace his aortal valve with an artificial valve. During the surgery, doctors diagnosed him with pulmonary hypertension. According to cdc.gov, “Pulmonary hypertension happens when the pressure in the blood vessels leading from the heart to the lungs is too high.” Following the surgery, he also developed pneumonia and remained in the hospital for another month.
At fourteen, Matthew went through his third open heart surgery. This time, it was to replace the mitral valve. Once again, he developed pneumonia. “He was put on an antibiotic for pneumonia but developed vancomycin toxicity, which caused his kidneys to begin shutting down,” said Julie. This time, he was in the hospital for two months.
Two months later, Matthew returned to Egleston for a heart cath. “That’s when the doctor at the transplant unit at Egleston told us that he wasn’t a good candidate for a new heart,” said Julie. “Matthew’s pulmonary hypertension was so bad that it would overwork a new heart and tear it up within hours.” Even at fourteen, Matthew understood the prognosis was a death sentence. “He cried and cried. “We were devastated. Doctors said he probably wouldn’t make it to his eighteenth birthday. He was short of breath because blood was backing up in his heart. He was basically in congestive heart failure on the right side all the time.”
The threat of losing Matthew hung over the entire family. Around Thanksgiving 2020, Matthews’s father was diagnosed with Covid. Art Villegas had served in law enforcement since 2000, most of that time with the Lyons Police Department. Tragically, on January 10, 2021, his father passed away due to complications from Covid. He was only fifty-nine years old at the time. “That was my absolute lowest,” said Matthew.
Heaven. Although his father was not physically with him anymore, Matthew realized, “He was watching over me. Knowing that really helped me.” The revelation of Hebrews 12:1 proved pivotal. A “great cloud of witnesses” surrounded Matthew, and his father's voice was among them.
All the while, doctors in Savannah continued to update Egleston with the results of Matthew’s echocardiograms. Then one day, Julie got a call. “Egleston wanted us to bring Matthew in for a consult. The transplant unit had a new surgeon named Dr. Shaw. They did C.T. scans, and after this new surgeon looked at everything, he brought us back into his office, and said Matthew had been approved for a heart transplant.”
For the first time, Matthew and his family had real hope. Even so, his pulmonary hypertension diagnosis meant that there were still great risks. “But Dr. Shaw was so confident that it would work. He had done this procedure at other hospitals, but not at Egleston. Matthew would be his first.”
On June 6, 2021, they received the call: They had a heart. Matthew was rushed to Egleston and readied for surgery. “He was just about to be sedated when Dr. Shaw called off the surgery,” said Julie. “He had found something wrong with the new heart. And with all Matthew’s complications, he said that if it were his child, he would not put this heart in his chest.” With heaviness, Julie agreed and Matthew returned home.
The second call came on June 25, and the following morning, Matthew received a new heart. The transplant surgery was a success, and he was put into a medically-induced coma to allow his body time to heal. By nightfall, Matthew was having seizures. “His blood pressure also dropped so low that the bottom number was in the 20s,” said Julie.
“My new heart was not cooperating with my lungs, and my lungs were trying to kill my new heart,” said Matthew. It was spoken with composure, as if he were an old man rather than a teenage boy.
“Dr. Shaw said Matthew would need to be put on an ECMO machine,” said Julie. “His pulmonary hypertension was working overtime and had already caused damage to the new heart. Without the ECMO, the doctor said Matthew would be dead by morning,” said Julie. ECMO is an acronym for “extracorporeal membrane oxygenation.” According to hopkinsmedicine.org, “ECMO is a form of life support for people with life-threatening illness or injury that affects the function of their heart or lungs” and “…does the jobs of the heart and lungs temporarily – allowing them to ‘rest.’”
Before reopening Matthew’s chest for the ECMO, the surgeon joined Julie, Joe, and Pastor Ricky Wilson in prayer. Within three days, the left side of Matthew’s heart had recovered almost 100%. A third time, his chest
was opened to remove the ECMO and attach an RVAD, which would give needed assistance to the right ventricle. Two weeks later, his chest was reopened for the fourth and final time since the transplant and the RVAD was removed.
For two and half weeks, Matthew remained in a medically-induced coma. “It was the longest time in our lives,” said his step-father, Joe. “Julie never left his side. I drove back and forth from Lyons to Atlanta Monday through Thursday to work and stayed through the weekends. (Joe owns J. & J. Lawn Care and Handyman Service). “I thought I was strong because I work outside. Matthew may be timid, but he is stronger than me. He’s the strongest person I know.”
Once again, Matthew developed pneumonia following surgery. Then, when the drain tube was removed, air got into his lungs, and a tube was inserted to get the air pocket out. All the complications and procedures kept Matthew at Egleston from June to August. Once released from the hospital, he spent a final two weeks in the Ronald McDonald House.
Since the transplant, Matthew’s pulmonary hypertension has continued to improve. “He no longer has to take medication for it,” smiled Julie. Of course, he’s still closely monitored and his anti-rejection meds are always taken precisely on time. Every six months to a year, biopsies are taken to ensure there is no necrosis, signaling the death of body tissue. If that happens, they’ll change up his meds.
According to organdonor.gov, 105,886 men, women, and children are on the national transplant waiting list. “17 people die each day waiting for an organ transplant.” This past year, a 95-year-old man became “the oldest donor in U.S. History” (lifegift. org). You’re never too old to make a difference. Matthew may never know the name of the person whose decision to become an organ donor saved his life, but he is grateful.
These days, Matthew is simply adjusting to normal life. “I actually have a ‘friend group’ now,” he said, then turned reflective. “I never thought it would be possible. I have friends that come over and just hang out.” The chance to have friends. That was all for which he had ever hoped.
Matthew caught up to grade level quickly. He’s set to graduate on time this spring (2022). When asked about his favorite subjects, he didn’t hesitate. “Mr. Corley’s audio and visual class and guitar with Mr. Bullard.” The guitar Matthew plays was his father's. Learning to play helps him feel his father’s spirit. There’s no doubt Art Villegas is proud of his son. After graduation, Matthew may pursue a degree in video and game development or perhaps a writing degree. There’s no rush. He now has time to decide.
In an article on theatlantic.com entitled, “Gen Z’ Only Exists in Your Head” by former staff writer Joe Pinsker, he writes, “We’re so busy dramatizing the symbolic differences between generations that we miss the real harms of being alienated from one another.” Matthew and his mentor, Micah, who also so happens to be my (amazing) son, are doing their part to ensure the generations stay connected.
With prayer, Matthew persisted and found strength to endure. With his father’s guitar, he remembered his father’s voice and found comfort in his ever present love. With a new heart, the shadow of death lifted and he discovered friendship and community again. In a time when the culture of the day hands out “victim” buttons to any and all, Matthew Villegas wears only a badge of courage.
