The Final Countdown

Today marks 6 weeks since the surgery.  Wow! Considering some of the days along the way seemed like the longest of my life, I can't believe how fast the time has gone by.  The goal of this week is to check all the final boxes and get the green lights to get back to normal.

I checked the first one this morning with my Cardiologist. He took me off sternal precautions which means I can drive again, lift more than 8 lbs, bend down and lift my arms above my head again. The kids shouldn't jump on me and I'm pretty sure I shouldn't vacuum or do too much housework again just yet, but otherwise, I'm good to go. This is a huge milestone and relief!!

The next 2 boxes should be checked on Thursday when I have a chest x-ray and meet with my surgeon. There is still a risk and some concern there may be a little fluid in my chest cavity that I've been battling. I'm hopeful that if there is, it won't be a big deal, but we'll find out for sure on Thursday.

With that, my plan is to return to work next Monday.  I'm supposed to ease back into things for a few weeks so I can monitor my energy levels, especially while going to Rehab 3x/week.  But for the most part, I should be good to go. 

Overall, I'm happy with each step towards normalcy. I feel like I've been an observer in watching my body heal for so long, and now I'm becoming an actual participant and have more control over things again.

Life is good!

Week 4 - Off to Rehab

As we round out week 4, I can officially say things are on the up and up!  I had 1 more thoracentesis done to remove more fluid from my chest just as I had the week before.  The good news is the volume was less this time and we are super hopeful that I won't have to do that again. I also had an Echocardiogram done on my heart and my Cardiologist says my heart looks great! Everyone is really, really pleased with the repair and are fairly confident that it should last forever.  Getting the rest of my body back to working order is a slow process, but as long as no one actually touches my heart again, all is good in my book.

This week is all about getting settled in to a Cardiac Rehab program. I'm super excited about this as it is basically a monitored exercise program that allows heart surgery patients to ramp back up in their exercise routines safely. After being sedentary for so long, I am indeed ready to start moving and see how much I both can and should be doing.

I'm doing my Rehab classes at Swedish Hospital in Seattle (as opposed to Harrison Hospital in Bremerton) for more convenience when I go back to work. They have a really nice facility with tons of equipment and heart monitors so they can see how your heart is responding to exercise. Now I need to figure out the best way to fit it into my schedule when I go back to work. And how to go every time without thinking of the Amy Winehouse song on Rehab.... No, no no....

Speaking of work - I will most likely go back in 2 weeks! It's hard to believe it's around the corner when it seemed so far away at the beginning.  I miss all my Starbucks partners and am looking forward to going back. Especially when I see all the exciting announcements today on the awesome work for Evolution Fresh.  And I also got the best food delivery from the great group of people I work with to make things easier on us for the next few weeks. I'm so grateful to be surrounded by so many kind and amazing people.

Life is good.

Week 3 - Very Humbling

After feeling pretty good in the 2nd week, I was ready to take Week 3 by storm. Bring it on! Let's keep this recovering moving along! So many people had told me that I looked great and I was doing so well and since I'm young, I must be on the fast track to recovery.  I have to admit, I had a little ego started that I was indeed kicking butt on this and felt like a heart surgery rock star.

Next thing I knew, I had a week filled with scary names like a Thoracentesis, Pneumothorax and Dressler's Syndrome as well as a trip to the ER at 3:30am and new pains and shortness of breath. Doh!

Now don't get me wrong - I'm really trying not to complain. I realized that the most when I was talking about my frustrations with my surgeon yesterday and he asked how long ago my surgery was.  I told him 3 weeks and 2 days.  His very sarcastic response was, "And you haven't fully recovered from heart surgery yet?! Come on!"  Yep, sarcasm works on me.

Everything I have experienced is fairly common. And I do think my complications and complications of the complications are settling down now and I have a good plan to get past them.

Going forward, I probably need to work on keeping my attitude in check. I'm still very positive and confident that I'm well on my way to recovering, but I'm also accepting the fact that my body needs more time than my mind would like to get everything back in balance. I've known that from the beginning, but this week was a good reminder of that reality.

Happy Friday all! And Happy SXSW to all my friends in Austin which is where I was planning on being this week before this little adventure. I'm with y'all in spirit while I go back to my recliner to finish another book.

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.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Today was a big day! I had to do a test in the morning from a possible complication from my last round of tests. The good news is that everything came back good on that and no concerns going forward. That was a huge relief.

Then Rob and I met with the surgeon in the afternoon. It was a good meeting with a lot of overwhelming information to say the least. We are still digesting everything, but in the end we felt comfortable enough to go ahead and schedule surgery with him.

So, we are all set for Valentine's Day! I know this may sound crazy, but I was really excited about getting it scheduled for this day. As much as I am dreading the whole experience, I am looking forward to being able to commemorate this day afterwards and use Valentine's Day as a way to celebrate my healthy heart year after year.

So we now have a date and are starting to work towards it and make our plans.

Snow Delay

We were supposed to meet with the surgeon today, but wouldn't you know it...we had our first snow storm of the year and everything came to a screeching halt. It was a fun day playing in the snow with the kiddos in between work meetings, but alas, now we have to wait and see when we can get the appointment rescheduled.

It's not a huge deal given I have time to do this. Just annoying as I'm anxious to learn more and set a date so we can have a final plan. But since we can't, I'll just go out and play in the snow. I love living in a place that shuts down a few times a year for snow. It's a great excuse to pause your life and just play without any other worries.

Valve Job - To Repair or Replace?

Rob and I have been joking about my need for a "valve job." The biggest question we were waiting to answer was whether the valve would be repaired or if it needed to be replaced.

To answer that question and ensure I was ready for surgery, I had 2 final tests done today. One was a Transesophageal Echocardiogram (TEE) to get a better picture of my mitral valve and the other was a heart catheter to make sure the rest of the heart looked good and there wouldn't be any other surprises come surgery time.

After a ridiculously early morning and then 6 hours in the hospital, we got the answer we were hoping for... The valve does indeed look repairable and other than the wimpy valve, my heart looks great! This is wonderful news because a replacement comes with many more potential complications for the rest of my life. With a repair, I have hopes of not having to deal with anything significant again after the surgery. I'm super happy to say the very least.

Next stop on the journey is a meeting with the potential surgeon on Wednesday afternoon. With that we'll have more information and be another step closer to the final plan.

Good day!

The Heart Journey Begins

How in the world did I go from a doctor saying to me, “You have the most boring medical history!” to preparing for heart surgery in less than a year??

I’m not sure how that happened, but it did. And my happy and boring medical history is officially out the window.

In a routine physical early last year where I just wanted to meet a doctor and have someone to go see when I got sick later, I found out I had a heart murmur that might be something. I had been told that by doctors before, but it would go away and I never felt any symptoms. I didn’t think I had symptoms this time either. Little did I know, I was actually having symptoms that I just kept dismissing them as I just needed to work out more and get into better shape.

Many tests and a visit to a Cardiologist later, I found out I had Mitral Valve Prolapse with moderate-to-severe regurgitation. I was told I could control it with medicine for now, but I would likely have to have surgery to fix it one day. And that one day could be in a month, 6 months, a year or 10 years and that there was no predicting how long that would be so I should just go on living my happy life.

So I starting taking a bunch of meds and visiting my Cardiologist every month. And I gave up caffeine. Now, this would have been fairly easy for me years ago, except I now work at Starbucks! You can’t turn around without being offered a tasting of the latest and greatest offering. But I’ve managed to avoid most of it without offending too many people along the way.

And the rest of the year was great! And I felt like a hero when I told my Cardiologist that I did a triathlon this summer! And everything was good! And I was even told I could stop my monthly appointments… unless something changed.

Wouldn’t you know it, about 6 weeks later, something changed. And my first thought on that change was again, “I feel so out of shape, maybe I need to start exercising more…” I quickly realized this time though, I wasn’t out of shape. I was indeed feeling new heart symptoms.

So I starting paying attention to them, but didn’t tell anyone for a little while. Especially not Rob because he would make me call my doctor. And calling my doctor would make it real again, and I wasn’t ready for it to be real again. I was happy being a healthy person without any worries.

But eventually, I had to admit it. So I casually mentioned it to Rob while in the kitchen one day. And I said it was no big deal, and maybe I would call my doctor in a few weeks, after the new year. And of course, he insisted I call him immediately and wouldn’t let me off the hook until I did.

So, I did. And now, here we are. Many tests later and confirmation of the “unknown length of time until we need to fix this valve” has come. It wasn’t the 10 years I had hoped it would be, but it wasn’t a month either.

Let the journey officially begin...