Kylie DeDominicis had three chambers in her heart rather than four. Since a young age, she'd used a pacemaker off and on.
After a pacemaker surgery two years ago, fluid buildup was detected in the right lung of the Woodstock teen. Local doctors said she needed a lung transplant. Her parents, however, sought treatment at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. Various surgeries and a cocktail of medications appeared to fix the problem, said her mother, Jackie DeDominicis of Woodstock. "We thought she was doing well."
On Friday, Mrs. DeDominicis went into her daughter's room to wake her up for another day at Sequoyah High, where Kylie was a freshman. The 14-year-old wasn't breathing.
Her funeral will be held at 1 p.m. Tuesday at St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church in Woodstock. Woodstock Funeral Home & Cremation Services is in charge of arrangements.
Kylie was born in Westerville, Ohio. She moved to metro Atlanta with her family in 2000. She was a kindergartner at the time.
From first to fifth grade, she was a cheerleader with the South Cherokee Recreation Department. She cheered in middle school, and had plans to return to the sport soon.
"She liked school," her mother said. "And from what I am seeing in Facebook, and from what they are doing at the school, she touched a lot of people."
Hannah Lee, 15, was one of those people. The girls had known each other since they were 5. Naturally Friday, the day of Kylie's demise, was difficult for Hannah and other Sequoyah High students.
"Our school was really great in that they let us stay in the auditorium," Hannah said. "We did a prayer group for Kylie, and we shared stories about how we met her, and how positive she was. She never complained about her condition. All she wanted to be was a regular teenager. I am glad she got to do some of that, to go to ballgames and stuff."
Preston Mott, a ninth-grader at Cherokee County's River Ridge High, met Kylie when they were eighth-graders at Dean Rusk Middle School in Canton.
"We didn't really start to talking till the ninth grade," he said. "We were really close friends. She really loved me and I really loved her. We weren't boyfriend and girlfriend, but that probably is what would have happened. I liked everything about her. Just everything."
Friday, Preston arrived at River Ridge to find one of Kylie's friends sobbing, barely able to speak. She relayed the news.
"I had been planning to ask [Kylie] to go to a movie," Preston said. "It would have been the first time we talked without calling on the phone or texting each other."
Kylie enjoyed boating and tubing on Lake Allatoona. Her musical tastes touched several genres. She enjoyed cooking with her father, Bruce DeDominicis of Woodstock. She'd talked about being an attorney, but her health issues had sparked an interest in medicine, too, her mother said.
"At one point, she talked about being a heart surgeon," she said. "She constantly asked questions. If she were to take three pills and there was only two, she'd ask why. She was very astute about all that."
Additional survivors include a brother, Nick DeDominicis of Woodstock.
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