By Kim Hilsenbeck
Just eight weeks ago, Landon Tyner, 15, of Buda was perfectly healthy. Starting Nov. 2, he will be on a waiting list for a new heart.
Landon has dilated cardiomyopathy – a congenital disease that weakens and enlarges the heart muscle. The disease progressed in him to the point of requiring a heart transplant.
“He knows he almost didn’t make it,” his mom Athena Tyner said. “His heart was leaking fluid – it was filling up his chest cavity so his lungs were bad, too.”
Landon spent his fifteenth birthday in Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. His parents, Athena and Case Tyner, along with their youngest son, Taylor, 13, temporarily relocated to Houston, staying at the Ronald McDonald House while Landon was hospitalized. Their oldest son, 20-year-old Cody, remains at their Buda home.
Athena said Landon is a typical teenager – he likes video games, basketball, and fishing.
“He really loves to fish,” she said.
He also loves football. Athena said Landon was practicing with the Hays High Rebels earlier in the summer.
“He had a hard time breathing,” she said. “We thought it was asthma.”
He then developed what she initially felt were more flu-like symptoms, including vomiting. She took him to Seton Medical Center Hays.
“They rushed him to Dell Children’s [in Austin] and then to Texas Children’s in Houston,” Athena said. “He was in congestive heart failure.”
Doctors first thought it was myocarditis, an inflammation of the myocardium, which is the middle layer of the heart wall. Myocarditis is usually caused by a viral infection.
But further tests revealed Landon has dilated cardiomyopathy.
“You hear about it all the time, athletes falling over dead on the field from this heart disease,” Athena said. “That could have been Landon.”
In August, doctors implanted a device, called LVAD, in Landon’s chest to help his heart beat, something it isn’t doing on its own. The device has batteries or must be plugged in at all times.
“We got one of those letters that says the electric company cannot shut off our power,” Athena said.
Because of the surgery, he wasn’t able to go on the transplant waiting list right away.
And though Landon is out of the hospital, the family isn’t heading back to Buda anytime soon. They accepted an offer from her husband’s company to stay at a residence in Conroe until Landon gets a new heart. Landon needs to be very near the hospital when the call comes in that they found an organ ready for transplant.
Landon, who was a 225-pound lineman, dropped down to 175 pounds over the summer. Athena said one of his biggest worries is not about his heart – it’s about how he’s going to get his Letterman jacket if he can’t play football.
“I was scared,” Landon said of the ordeal. “I’m disappointed I can’t play football no more. The whole thing is a real disappointment.”
What did he miss most over the summer?
“My friends. I was going to go to Schlitterbahn,” he said. “I can’t go swimming or anything with this device [in my chest].”
And while his muscles atrophied some while in the hospital, Landon said he is walking around perfectly fine.
| Landon prior to learning he has a heart condition. (Photo by Athena Tyner) |
“I’m so much better since the hospital,” he said.
What else does he miss about home?
“I really miss Plucker’s in San Marcos. I’m missing wings!” he said with a laugh.
Another summertime disappointment was not getting his learner’s permit, Athena said.
But she realizes there will be time for that later. Getting Landon healthy and waiting for a donor heart is the family’s priority.
She and her husband are already starting to think about the medical bills that will start to pile up. Just while Landon was in the hospital, she said they paid $300 parking, several hundred in meals. She’s also thinking about schools tutors and medications; Landon will need 12 different prescriptions.
“The bills haven’t really hit yet, but they will,” she said.
Her sister-in-law, a nurse, said with the nearly two-month hospital stay along with a heart transplant surgery on the horizon, the medical bills could be as high as $1 million.
But their focus is on Landon right now, which is why Athena said she is grateful for her friends, neighbors and community members in Buda, who have organized several fundraisers to help the Tyners.
“We basically just left our house,” Athena said. “The community has been supportive – they organized fundraisers for Landon.”
So far, she said there are several fundraising options, including a BBQ and bake sale on Oct. 13 at the Kwik Kar in Buda. The event will feature a live auction by Sample & Son of Buda and live music will be provided by James Downing and Six Sons of a Gun.
A friend of hers, Mark Hufford, co-owner of Personali-T-Z in Buda, created a t-shirt that says Team Landon. The company, co-owned by Tina Galindo, is
selling them for $20; about 42 percent goes to Landon’s family.
Athena said they also have Team Landon rubber bracelets on sale.
“I’d love to get those out to the football team,” she said.
Chili’s in Buda is also holding “give back” nights in September where they will donate 10 percent of the bill to Landon.
Another community member set up a bank account at First State Bank in Buda in Landon’s name for those who wish to make a cash donation.
“We’ve gotten a lot of support – the community has been great. I think we have $500 in the account so far just from t-shirt sales,” Athena said.
Her voice wavered.
“I never expected this kind of outpouring,” she said.
