Candi Anderson's Story

“I used to vibrate with the exertion of the pounding of my heart.”

Seeing her niece born and her identical twin get married were two things Candi Anderson thought would never happen.

Although identical on the outside, Candi and her twin, Cedar, were born with a major difference: Candi’s heart didn’t pump blood properly into her lungs. Transposition of the major arteries meant Candi had to have surgery at four years of age to redirect the blood flow in her heart.

“I used to vibrate with the exertion of the pounding of my heart. When I was really tired, it was visible that my heart was beating that hard. I could always feel it,” she said.

“It was just too tiring to eat, it took too much energy to put it in your mouth and have to chew it… If it wasn’t for Mum, I wouldn’t have made it. She would wait until I was asleep and put a bottle in my mouth.”

Being so sick meant Candi was unable to keep up at school. She had to repeat kindergarten and her twin was always a year ahead.

When she was opened up again on her 14th birthday, the doctors didn’t expect to find that the shunt had been growing with her heart and could no longer be removed. The second surgery reopened a hole in the main ventricle to allow blood flow.

At 18, another “patch up job” was thought to be the best option for the young woman considered too complicated for a transplant.

Fortunately, Candi’s determined survival convinced her doctors to give her a shot. As she was getting ready for a Halloween party on 31 October, 1996, Candi received the call offering her another chance at life.

“I got the phone call and everything after that I don’t remember. I think I went into shock, your body just blocks it out,” Candi says. “When I woke up from the transplant, I couldn’t feel my heart. I asked what was wrong and they told me it was normal, I wasn’t supposed to feel my heart beating.”

The complexity of Candi’s operation included putting the new heart in on an angle and wrapping the artery around the back of her heart to connect it to the lungs. After a month in hospital, Candi returned home to continue recovery.

“I’ve been extremely lucky… I’ve been around to see friends get married and have kids. I’d like to have kids but I know I can’t. That hurts… You don’t keep many friends. You don’t get a job because people think you’ll die. People assume that because you’re sick, you’re still sick, you can’t be trusted, can’t be relied on, but you’re still capable of functioning in a normal way.”

On the 12th anniversary of her transplant, Candi planted a tree in the hospital grounds in memory of her donor and to honour all organ donors. The tree will grow along with the people who have been given another chance at life.

“I wouldn’t be here, it’s as simple as that, just getting older. Realistically, if I get to 50, that’s great. Anything after that is extra.”