VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — The holidays are about spending time with family. That's why Janell Hull, a Virginia Beach mother of two, is thankful to be alive this holiday season to see her family after suffering from a rare form of heart failure.
"My diagnosis with heart failure was so bad that they didn’t even think I was going to make it far. Once upon a time, I never knew if I was going to see my kids go on the school bus and go to school," Hull said.
Hull is celebrating her second anniversary of her heart transplant.
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"It’s been a long journey. I developed heart failure through pregnancy. It’s called Peripartum Cardiomyopathy where women develop it during pregnancy or during the post part period," Hull said.
One in every 4,000 pregnant women are at risk of developing the rare heart condition, according to the National Institute of Health.
Hull says it was hard to do simple tasks with her two kids after giving birth to her second child.
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"I was consistently going into cardiac arrest," Hull said.
Hull says she got moved up on the list to get a transplant when she started going into cardiac arrest frequently.
"Enough blood wasn’t being pumped out from my heart to the rest of my body. It caused my heart to overwork. It was like a big deflated football. There were some good days and some bad days but the bad days outnumbered the good days. When you’re a new mom raising two children, two under 2, it was very taxing," Hull said.
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She's grateful to be celebrating the holidays with family and with a better heart.
"Having a heart transplant has allowed me to be the best mother to my children," Hull said.
