When It All Changed by Shelley Wiart

Prompt: when it all changed

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​The call came from an unknown number.

I had been bracing myself for news from my dad’s healthcare team, a constant undercurrent of dread threading through my days. He had been at the University of Alberta Hospital for a month, his health condition an enigma growing darker and more impenetrable with each passing day. No diagnosis, no clarity—only the endless churn of tests, speculation, and a grim kind of waiting.

​He had been medevacked from Stanton Territorial Hospital in Yellowknife to Edmonton in mid-August, the urgency of his condition necessitating a transfer 

to specialists and equipment that the North simply could not provide. What I had naively assumed would be a brief journey to answers had spiralled into a medical labyrinth.

“When I first arrived for treatment in August,” my dad recounted over the phone weeks earlier, his voice simmering with anger, “they locked me in the bowels of the U of A Hospital for weeks—even after my TB test came back negative.” Usually subdued by fatigue, his voice now carried the sharp edge of indignation. “That East Indian doctor took one look at my chart—lung issues—and where I’m from—the North—and decided I must have tuberculosis. Because, you know,” he adds with biting sarcasm, “every Northern Native person must have TB.”

Fighting his illness was hard enough, but battling the pervasive racism shadowing his care was draining what little energy he could muster.

I was standing in my tiny kitchen in our downtown Yellowknife condo, cooking taco meat for dinner, when I answered the call. We had moved to this city just three months earlier, and now it felt as though we were caught in an unexpected storm, one we hadn’t seen coming.

The voice on the other end of the line was calm, deliberate. “This is Dr. Chen,” she began, identifying herself as my dad’s physician. “We’ve discovered a severe bacterial infection in his abdomen, which we are treating with the strongest antibiotics available. His diarrhea and stomach pain appear to be symptoms of this infection. However…”

The pause stretched, heavy and unrelenting, the kind that primes you for devastation.

“We’re also awaiting results from his genetic testing to confirm a diagnosis of Vexas Syndrome,” she continued, “It’s an extremely rare autoimmune condition caused by mutations on the X chromosome. Patients develop inflammatory and hematologic symptoms—persistent fever, rashes, arthritis, and inflammation in the eyes, cartilage, and blood vessels. It can cause frequent infections, anemia requiring blood transfusions and bone marrow failure. There is no cure. The only potential treatment is a bone marrow transplant, but even that is largely experimental.”

She paused, perhaps to let me absorb what she had just said.

“There are additional complications unrelated to Vexas Syndrome that we’re concerned about,” she added, her tone softening slightly. “Your dad mentioned you’re in Yellowknife right now. I strongly advise you to book a flight to Edmonton as soon as possible.”

​Her words hung in the air, sharp and unyielding, transforming my world in an instant.

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About Shelley Wiart
I am a Métis academic pursuing a Master of Arts in Leadership at Royal Roads University. Alongside my studies, I served as a full-time caregiver for my dad, who underwent a bone marrow transplant at Foothills Hospital in 2022.