My 13th birthday is one that stands out for me. It was spent in hospital during my 6 week stay not too many days after I had just had a haemorrhage and nearly died.

The day I haemorrhaged was one of the scariest of my life. I was feeling really off that day and when I stood up to go to the bathroom everything went black, I suddenly hit the floor and after that everything is a bit of a blur. I somehow managed to drag myself to the bathroom and press the emergency button whilst falling in and out of consciousness. In the mean time I’m laying there in a giant pool of my own blood because an ulcer had tunnelled its way through my intestine. I still remember the nurse walking in seeing me and saying “shit I NEED HELP!” 😂

Next thing I know the room is full of doctors and nurses working urgently on me. They decided to wait a few days to see if I’d need surgery which inevitably I did, but in the meantime it was absolutely no food.

So here I am, on my 13th birthday not allowed any food after nearly dying, no biggie. I headed to the freezer in the patient kitchen to get myself some ice. I opened up the freezer and there it was a Freddo ice cream cake labeled “Morgan”. At the children’s hospital they order an ice cream cake for every child’s birthday. Apparently no one let the ward know that I was nil by mouth, and to add insult to injury my dads work bought me a birthday hamper full of chocolate. I lied in bed crying over the chocolate and ice cream cake I wasn’t allowed to have, at least now I can look back at that experience and laugh. Next birthday I’m going to have my cake and I’m going to eat it too. I hope it’s bloody delicious.