OBSTACLES, LESSONS, & HOPE

Chapter 3 Amazing Jazmine I remember going to parks, playing with her and pushing her in the swings. Seeing the smile on her face was truly amazing. I recall playing with her and her toys and watching her favorite movies such as The Little Rascals and her favorite cartoons like The Little Mermaid. These were the things we loved to do together, and I wanted to spend all day every day with her. We also spent time doing arts and crafts. What a great time we had expressing ourselves though art, figuring out what we had made. There was playing with play dough and making a mess with paints. These are all things you might do with a childhood friend when you are growing up, but these are things I did with my sister Jazmine. Jazmine Marie Borgum was my sister’s name, but she is much more than just a sister to me. She was my best friend and my other half. I’m not sure why that was but we just connected spiritually, with our hearts, as if we shared the same breath and our hearts shared the same beat. I felt the need to do everything for her and show her that I was always going to be there for her. I wanted to show her that she was the best gift my mom could have given me before she died. I also felt the need to protect her because she was the only girl out of the three kids. I was the oldest, and she was the youngest and a girl. I really felt the need to take care of her. Maybe it was because of a brotherly instinct that I had. Whatever it was, we were two peas in a pod. Jazmine was only ten months old when we found out what was wrong with her. From the time that Jazmine was born she had a failure to thrive and had seizures. The doctors were completely baffled by her illness and couldn’t figure out what was wrong with her. They tested her for everything they could think of, and still they were puzzled. My mom had not been sick, so they had not thought of the HIV virus although as a last resort they later did that test. When my mom was pregnant with us kids they did not test mother-to-be for the HIV virus so we did not know that mom had the virus. She hit the statistic right on that; one out of three children born to a mother with the HIV virus would also be affected On November 4th of 1992 we found out that both Mom and Jazmine were HIV Positive. It was incredible! Even though Jazmine had this thing that would someday end up killing her, she didn’t let her symptoms run her life. She always had a smile on her face no matter what. She was always happy and cheerful. I can’t believe a kid having to hurt like that, and still she was happy, never upset with the world, just thankful to be alive, thankful to spend her time with her family. I won’t ever forget her and her strength. She is my hero. I was determined to spend as much time as possible with Jazmine as I could. I knew it was possible that the same thing that happened to my mom would happen to my sister. I knew that I wanted to bond with her and share a special connection that only the two of us could have. So that is what I did. I spent most of my time catering to her and trying to be the best big brother that I could be to her. We developed a relationship that was untouchable. We became extremely close. I was her everything and she was my everything. I lived each day to spend time with her because I knew what could happen and where this road could lead. My sister was more than a sister or a best friend to me. She was like my angel, sent from heaven. When you looked at her or into her eyes you would always smile. She had this glow about her that shined like no other. When you were in her presence, you felt happy and thankful. With her presence, it was amazing how many people lives she impacted. Whoever came in contact with her had their lives changed for the better. It truly was as if she was an angel here on earth. Even her Doctor told Grandma that both his life and the life of his nurse were changed forever because of Jazmine. Jazmine had some traits about her that were remarkable. Here my sister was extremely young with AIDS. She was in so much pain because every part of her body had been touched by the virus. I remember going to the hospital and seeing her with all those machines around her and with all those tubes in her. Still she always had a smile on her face no matter what. She was so sick that at times she would just sit there and shake with excruciating pain. It’s remarkable to me that this child who had AIDS and wouldn’t live much longer had the most optimistic outlook, no matter how she felt on that day. There would be times when people would go to visit her and she would be so sick she would talk to them for five minutes; then she would get extremely tired and go to sleep. When someone came to visit her, their perspective would be changed. I am proud to have had her as my sister. She was truly an inspiration to anyone who came in contact with her. Jazmine had to have tubes in her, G-tubes, J-tubes, the works. She couldn’t eat like a normal person, but she loved dill pickles. Another thing she liked to do was go through the telephone book and sing the songs “The Itsy Bitsy Spider” and “Over in the Meadow.” Jazmine loved to color and read books. We would go to the hospital, bring chicken to eat, bring our sleeping bags to sleep on the floor and spend the night with her. Grandma wanted us to be able to spend as much time with Jazmine as possible. Often times Jazmine was flown to the Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago to be taken care of. That was the closest hospital that knew how to take care of a child with AIDS. My sister would be flown there to have tests done and be taken care of. After a week or two there she would be able to return home to Sioux Falls. I remember spending a lot of my time and childhood in Chicago due to my sister’s illness. While she was at the hospital in Chicago we would do arts and craft things there. One time we made ceramic leafs. The Children’s Memorial Hospital had a special worked out for families with sick children where we got to stay at the Embassy Suites in Chicago. My mom would joke and say that it cost more for us to park the car than to stay at the Embassy Suites, which were right downtown. I loved that hotel. Going in the swimming pool they had down stairs that was always fun for me and in the mornings, their breakfasts were unbelievable. While we would be in Chicago and Jazmine was at the Children’s Memorial Hospital, our family would always explore the area and go to the Big Nick store down town. We even went and ate at Michael Jordan’s restaurant, which I loved so much because he was my favorite basketball player. I would always get my hopes up about the possibilities of maybe meeting him or seeing him in his own restaurant. But I never did get to see him. There would be times when the pain became too much and there would be times that my sister couldn’t even walk and had a wheel chair. It was so difficult for her to function and do things that a normal child her age would do with ease. My sister had so much fight and had so much will to do the things that healthy people did, and she put her mind to accomplishing this.