Week 2

Tomorrow will officially be 2 weeks post-surgery.  Everyone has suggested that I take the recovery day-by-day since there will be many highs and lows.  But I think looking back week-by-week is even better.  It's just like kids, you don't know how much they are changing when you see them every day.  So while I haven't necessarily felt daily improvements, I can definitely see and feel weekly improvement!


We'll just skip past the first 6 days in the hospital.  It was long and hard and just an unbelievable experience. I'll never forget it or the people involved.


Now that I've been home for a week, I've had the fortune to be completely pampered and doted upon by my parents and hubby the whole time. I even had a friend send me a bell to ring in case no one is around when I need something.  The boys think it's an awesome new toy, much to Rob's dismay - ha!


In the last week, I can see significant improvement in my ability to get up and down and move around.  Little things like getting dressed are still kind of hard, but taking a shower doesn't wear me as much as it did. And best of all, I had increasing energy as the week went on to even have some short outings - to watch Jonas' swim class, go to a matinee movie and a drive up to Port Gamble for lunch. All of those would have been impossible a week earlier.  I've learned to knit and have started a scarf, finished my first book (Swimming to Antarctica - highly recommended), done lots of breathing exercises and walks around the house, played some WWF, watched fairly limited TV and been online only enough to feel connected with people.  Looking back now, it was a good week all in all.


Now it's time for some goals for the week ahead.  More work on the scarf, find a new book, see more friends, have a few more outings - doctor's appointment, lunch with a friend, more swim classes and maybe even tackling something on the to-do list like organizing our photos. 


I would also like to start accepting some of the offers we've had for help along the way as my folks (and all of their amazing help!) are heading out tomorrow.  We still have quite a few weeks ahead where I'm going to be useless in ways of "helping" around the house - cleaning, cooking, taking care of kids. While I am definitely feeling better, I'm not feeling that well yet!!


Life is indeed good.

Home Sweet Home

Back home now settling in with as much normalcy as possible. Couldn't be happier!

More later, but for now, good night.

The ups and downs of Recovery Road

Lovely patient # 68915, is doing quite well. Since our last episode our heroine has graduated from the intensive care unit to the progressive care unit, and is...progressing! Objects, tubes, wires, and machines have steadily left her body and the hospital room has quieted down substantially over the last couple days. I welcome the new peace happily, fewer bells and whistles, fewer pokes and prods, and a happier patient. She's able to get up and walk around now, doing laps of the nurses station to help get her moving again.

There's been a few set backs, a few confounding blood numbers that are slow to recover and work their way back to the normal range and ensure everything is stabilized post-surgery. And a small lung issue we're hoping gets smaller with the next chest X-ray. A couple more lines here, and a tube there, and a check box or two and we should be able to go home.

They've even already had us watch the discharge and post-hospital stay videos..which Vid promptly fell asleep to...alas, another little side effect of a little ol' open heart surgery: happy go lucky Vida able to sit up, talk and eat, and walk around, and play words with friends one minute, to a completely sacked out eyelids of lead sleeping beauty. Just as she is right now.

Night night sweetie.

Day 2

Just another quick note to get the word out, the surgery went well and
Vid is recovering steadily in the ICU. Quite the roller coaster of a
day. Not quite out of the woods, but on the right path.

Had her sitting up in a side chair this morning, but back in bed and
enjoying modern pharmaceuticals now.

Should be steadily removing tubes and lines today as she progresses.

Love to all.

Out of surgery, heading to ICU

Surgery went well, heading to ICU.

Love to all, Rob

3 Little Requests

Tomorrow is the big day. And I am definitely anxious to get this over and done with and start moving on!

Many people have been asking what they can do to help. I thought I'd take a moment to tell you exactly what I would like tomorrow because there are 3 things you can do that would make me extra happy.

1. Think about me between 7am - 1pm PST. Send all your good vibes, happy thoughts, prayers and just all over positive energy my way on Tuesday morning for a smooth, complication-free operation.

2. Hug your loved ones extra tight. Take a moment to pause and squeeze them just a little more than usual.

3. Do something nice for someone.  I absolutely love the Starbucks Valentine's message this year to Celebrate Everylove. If you haven't seen the videos, check them out because they are so nice and uplifting. So whether it's buying coffee for the person behind you in the drive-thru, or picking up lunch for a co-worker or calling someone you haven't talked to in a long time, please do it tomorrow. I think that would be awesome and I'd love to hear the stories afterwards.

With that, I'm signing off.  The next few updates will come from Rob.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!
xoxox

Embracing the Kindness

Admittedly, the last 2 weeks have been fairly stressful and quite an emotional ride. I was trying to get everything in order and wrap up things at work so I could comfortably step away for awhile to take care of this little heart thing. At the same time, I was also beginning to share the news with more and more people as to my current situation. And wouldn't you know it, all along the way, people are being so nice and so kind to me! And as weird as it is to say, I wasn't ready for that. And I mean, literally... I wasn't ready for that, not that I was surprised it was happening.

I was talking to my sister one morning on my way to the ferry and sharing my latest stresses and what was bothering me. And she said something wise (like she always does) to the effect of, "At some point you gotta realize there are a lot of people who care about you and just embrace it." It hit me at that moment that I wasn't embracing it whatsoever. In fact, I was putting up a big wall trying to push it away.

Maybe embracing it made it all that more real. Or maybe embracing it showed my vulnerability. Or maybe I really just wasn't ready.

Then somewhere along the way, I realized I was ready. Ready to accept it. Ready to finally feel all the love and kindness and just plain goodness that was being given to me by so many people. Ready to actually embrace it. And this time it felt good. Crazy good as we would say in one of my projects at work.

I am so glad I finally made it to this point. Last night was such a wonderful night just being together with my favorite Starbucks partners. And accepting all the words and hugs and thoughtfulness each of them has been trying to give me that I had actually been avoiding. It was more special to me than I think any of my words expressed. I am truly, truly thankful.