It's Better Than The Happiest Place On Earth

Teenage Heart Transplant

Before I get into details about my first day returning to camp, I would just like to thank the Nick and Kelly Foundation and all the sponsors of Camp Del Corazon. I feel like thank you isn’t even that expressive of a word to show how appreciative I am, so it will only be proper to show my appreciation in a camp orderly fashion…

Last year, my cabin was Cutter. This year, my cabin is Schooner and I already knew three girls who I had in my cabin last year. There were five of us from Arizona; Sammy, Selena, Victoria, Marissa, and myself. The other three girls were from California, Kasey, Katelyn, and Brianna. My counselors this year were Kokopop, Mrs. Bionic, Flipper and Izzy along with our favored fanny pack lady, Miffy, our med nurse (who was also my med nurse last year).

After waiting for our luggage to be loaded on to the boat, we loaded ourselves and were finally heading to Catalina Island! The boat ride took a couple hours, but time fly’s when your catching up with old friends. You never notice how close you are to the island until you start slowing down and you can spot the girl cabins from a distance.

After high fiving all my favorite counselors leading to the Dining Hall, we went over all the rules and procedures of composting, lost items, boundaries, which cabin eats first, and all that fun stuff. After eating the first of many delicious meals, we headed towards C’s Hut to pick up our luggage and settle into our cabins.

(Note to Self: Next year put something really obvious and eye captioning on your suitcase so a counselor doesn’t have to assist you in finding you’re suitcase out of the twenty others that look exactly like yours)

Everyone in my cabin knows this place frontwards, backwards, upside down, and inside out so the Camp Tour was a breeze. After the camp tour was dinner, another scrumptious meal, which was leading to Disco Bingo. Unknowingly, I brought the perfect 70′s outfit to wear for a night of personal parties and conga lines. I’ve yet to win a bingo under any category so I’m hoping I’ll get some kind of graduating camper luck for my last year as a camper.

Once Disco Bingo was over it was time to go back to our cabins to pass out from a long day of traveling and excitement. For our first cabin closing we named off each our personal goals for this year. My goals was to stand on top of the Eagles Perch during high ropes and to get thirds at least once and still manage to be apart of the Clean Plate Club(CPC). After our counselors left for their Staff Meeting, my friend Sammy jumped in my bunk and we all stayed up talking and laughing about simple things until a counselor came in and told us we’re keeping the entire girl’s camp awake… Highly doubtful but it made us go to sleep.

The next day was the first full day of activities at CDC!

My name is Shelby Cooper and I have had two heart transplants. Living with heart disease has encouraged me to spread Congenital Heart Disease Awareness, and to tell kids with heart defects; you’re not alone.
Blog: teenagehearttransplant.blogspot.com