Courtesy: Randall Haley
Some patients have compared it to breathing through a straw. Others have dreaded the horrible visits that reveal information that will either bring them to tears or joy. Twenty-three-year-old Valerie Pettit said cystic fibrosis won’t stop her from living her dreams.
Strong-willed and stubborn, Pettit refuses to listen to doctors as they attempt to place a number on the days of her life.
“When I was born, they said I wouldn’t live past five years old,” Pettit said. “And then they said I wouldn’t live to graduate high school.”
Pettit, who is from Tupelo, received her high school diploma in 2010 and her bachelor’s degree in business administration from Mississippi State University in 2014 and plans to attend law school when she learns more of how a new study drug will affect her health.
From the time she wakes up until she lies down, Pettit said she is conscious of her condition and performs as many exercises as possible to improve her health.
Pettit takes nearly 15 pills every morning, medications which promote bone health, increase appetite and decrease acid in the stomach, among many others.
Pettit must take breathing treatments two to three times a day to increase her lung function. With them, Valerie straps on a vest, which helps the mucus surface. She described the strenuous vest treatment as uncomfortable yet necessary.
A majority of cystic fibrosis patients must attend monthly checkups, but Pettit has remained stable enough to go for a clinical visit every three to four months. When she was a child, the average number of times she would be admitted for a hospital stay, which generally lasted 10 days, was six times a year. That number has decreased to once a year for Pettit.
Though she is doing remarkably well now, her family experienced one of the biggest scares of Pettit’s lifetime in May 2014.
The family was on their way to Atlanta from Tupelo to attend a Braves game, and they stopped in Birmingham for Valerie’s blood to be drawn, so doctors could see how her antibiotics were affecting her.
“We went to Atlanta that Tuesday night,” Pettit said. “Wednesday afternoon, the doctor called, said, ‘Get to Birmingham, you’re in kidney failure.’”
Pettit was in the hospital for about 15 days and was put on dialysis four or five times during her stay.
“That was the worst pain I’ve ever had in my entire life,” she said. “We really thought I wasn’t going to make it. I shouldn’t have made it.”
Pettit said her mother, who drove 100 miles per hour to get her to the hospital in Birmingham and is by her side in every hospital stay and there for almost every checkup, is her biggest encouragement.
“She is there 99 percent of the time,” Pettit said.
Her brother, Allen Pettit, 24, does his share of help and support, too.
“As her brother, CF basically puts huge amounts of stress on me everyday,” he said. “I ask myself everyday, ‘Why her? Why could it not be me?’”
Allen Pettit said that he encouraged his sister to share an apartment with him in Starkville while they were both attending classes at MSU.
“We were roommates, so that I could watch her and make sure she was healthy,” Allen Pettit said.
Pettit’s brother recalled a moment when he and Valerie were younger and in the hospital.
“When she was in children’s hospital (Le Bonheur), we used to get her out of the room and roll around in wheel chairs to boost her spirits,” he said.
Pettit has many friends who suffer from cystic fibrosis who she said provide her with courage, as she does them.
Unfortunately, Pettit can’t come in close proximity with these friends because of the frailty of cystic fibrosis patients, who are extremely susceptible to common illnesses such as the flu or even a simple head cold, which greatly weaken their immune systems.
Molly Reynolds, also a cystic fibrosis patient, has only spoken with Pettit through Facebook.
“Valerie has encouraged me in many ways but mainly through her perseverance to remain healthy (and) positive, even when CF tries to knock her down,” Reynolds said.
Another friend of Pettit’s, Amberly Knowles, has never met Pettit in person either, but the two keep in close contact through texting as well as social media.
“Valerie seems to handle her CF very well,” Knowles said. “When she gets a bad report, she tries to prove the doctors wrong.”
Friends typically see Pettit as being strong, but she confessed that she, too, gets down at times. With the progress researchers are making in finding a cure, however, she said there have never been more exciting times for cystic fibrosis patients.
Pettit said researchers have now found a medicine that dramatically improves lung function for four percent of the cystic fibrosis population. Although the medicine won’t help her particular case, she said she hopes a cure will be discovered in the next five years due to all the information researchers have found.
Pettit finds it vital for cystic fibrosis patients to be active as a means to help their lung functions.
“When other parents come and talk to us,” she said. “I say, ‘be sure and keep the child active as long as you can. Do sports, do anything.’”
Pettit played every sport possible while she was in high school and said her lung function decreased while she was in college, the only time she was not playing sports.
Pettit enjoys a trip to see the Atlanta Braves at least once a year to boost her spirits and travels to the beach for vacation as often as possible because the salty air helps her lungs. She also plays church league softball, has plans to get married in June and continuously posts to Facebook to keep her friends and fans updated on her cystic fibrosis journey. Pettit will fight until the day a cure is found.
“Now what, CF?” Pettit said. “Here’s to kicking CF’s butt.”
