Freshman Hunter Tims hoists his sousaphone on his shoulders and takes a deep breath, preparing to step off onto the marching field for the first time since his open heart surgery over the summer.
“Mixing together marching band and my heart just makes me thankful that I’m here and able to do these things,” Tims said. “I’m just glad that I’m still alive.”
Over the summer, Tims had an open heart surgery to fix his bicuspid aortic valve. Operated on in the hospital for five days, Tims received tons of tubes and IVs. Doctors worked on him to reverse his enlarged heart valve which expanded to almost double the size that it’s supposed to be.
“For one of the days I was completely asleep, and I don’t remember anything that happened,” Tims said. “The worst part in the hospital was the fact that I couldn’t lie down or get up without being in pain.”
On the fifth day in the hospital, the doctors took out his neck tube, stomach tube and intestinal tube and cleared Tims to leave, but he wasn’t allowed to do very much to prevent opening up the incision in his chest.
“I was having a hard time showering because I couldn’t put water on my front chest for a week after getting out of the hospital,” Tims said, “and then I had six weeks of not being able to lift anything heavier than a gallon of milk.”
Tims recovered for the rest of the summer and prepared for the up-and-coming marching season. Tims could not march unless he got his physical release form signed by a doctor, but he got it signed the day before band camp started.
“I was really nervous about how it was all gonna go because it was the day after I had immediately gotten released from everything and honestly, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be,” Tims said.
While learning basic marching, Tims not only had to figure out how to carry and play a new instrument and find out how to march in the 100-degree weather in the middle of July, but he also had to deal with his own heart problems.
“It was a challenge because as soon as I picked the sousaphone up, I was like, ‘okay, I can stand like this,’ but my section leader said ‘no, you can’t have your feet like that,’” Tims said. “I had to think about so many things at once while carrying a 30-pound instrument on my shoulders and trying to play it. It was a lot to think about, but I enjoyed it.”
Tims practices and rehearses with band, and he pays close attention to his heart rate to ensure he isn’t overexerting himself.
“I feel like this year’s marching season is going to be a good challenge for me,” Tims said. “I am very excited and proud of how far I’ve come this year.”
Junior Reagan Wright, sousaphone section leader, taught Tims all of his marching and playing technique while also trying to help keep Tims safe.
“It’s an interesting experience because he’s really good. However, he was required to sit out more for risk of injury,” Wright said. “We’re just making sure that he’s constantly okay by checking up on him a lot more than anybody else.”
A new heart valve makes you have to pay a lot more attention while marching or doing any physical activity to ensure one does not overexert themselves, especially since it can make your heart rate immediately drop by 20 beats per minute.
“He told me a couple of times that he wanted to keep going,” Wright said. “Sometimes he even described the pain as a steel ball feeling in his chest. I told him if you feel like you’re in pain or anything, just step out. I don’t even care if it’s the middle of a set, just get out and make sure you’re not in pain.
Four months have passed since Tim’s operation and doctors cleared him to do more and more physical activity as time went on, and he will march on throughout this year’s marching band season.
“Ever since surgery, I feel like I have almost become supercharged. I feel like I have so much more energy and I can do things that I couldn’t do before,” Tims said. “I already have made so many great friends and band has been a great experience.”
