SIX WEEKS AFTER OPEN HEART SURGERY

SIX WEEKS AFTER OPEN HEART SURGERY

JULY 2 – Open Heart Surgery – AdventHealth Pepin Heart Institute

JULY 2 – JULY 5 – Intensive Care at Pepin

JULY 5 – JULY 10 – ROOM 119 – Hospital Room at Pepin

JULY 10 – JULY 24 – ROOM 26 a – Cardio Rehab – Concordia Village Med Center

JULY 24 – To Present – Home (August 12, 2019)


Each of these designations and transitions are indelible and permanent impressions on my psyche.

Important lessons of life have been learned that have changed me forever. Indeed, I have been jolted awake.

As one nurse put it, “Once a man, twice a baby.” I can relate to that in every sense.

I was aware that all dignity was gone when I had my first unanticipated BM when my nurses were attempting to get me up to weigh me and ended up having to change my diaper.

It struck me that the high and the low are reduced to a common dependent class when they can no longer take care of themselves in the most practical sense.

After 6-hours of surgery with a heart lung machine keeping me alive while the surgeon and his team worked on the heart, the human body kicks into action to counter this radical intrusive invasion.

The body begins to swell, taking on fluid. This resulted in my body weight increasing from 226 to 242.

Diuretics were applied which resulted in my peeing every few minutes including, on occasion, peeing my pants. This was necessary to bring the swelling and my weight down, a process, at some level that continued into my rehabilitation phase.

Today, I weigh 205, which is partly due to the fact that I still have little appetite for food and all that water weight is off of my body. That said, my cardiologist hopes I will maintain this new weight for the health of my heart.

Sleep, once my kindest friend now avoids me like my worst enemy. To illustrate the horrors of time, especially when I should be sleeping, the clock in the hospital drove me to near panic as it seemed to move so slowly. I hated nights then and now I hate them at home.

Were it not for my wife, Beautiful Betty, who often spent 10 to 12 hours with me in hospital, and now at home, 24/7, I don’t believe I would have made it, as it was such a radical departure from anything I had experienced before. Other than a short stay in the hospital for an appendectomy, and essentially never suffering from debilitating sickness in my long life, I was not prepared for this.

In the 33 years of our marriage, I still sometimes wonder where BB musters the stamina and courage to persevere, but she does. She is even reading to me every night, a book she is enjoying, to help put me to sleep at night.

My daughter Laurie often visited me in the hospital and gave BB relief during those periods. In addition, since I’ve been home, she has spelled BB so she could shop and run errands as it was not prudent to leave me unattended at this point as there is always the possibility that I might fall. We are two very close people, BB and I, but this has created a new bond with my daughter that has brought father and daughter closer to together.

With all risks, there are bound to be surprises. Mine is that in this surgery or in the constant sticking of needles in me to draw blood, the ulna nerve was damaged so that I have no sensory feeling to the last three fingers of my left hand.

Typing is impossible! I created this document with my index finger. It may take six months or a year to realize sensation, or perhaps never.

What I have experienced and will continue to experience is common to many. Since many of you have wondered when I would return to writing books and missives, this should provide some explanation of the inactivity on my email and blog. I will still read emails from those interested in staying in touch with me.

Moreover, people may check my blog (www.peripateticphilosopher.blogspot.com) where there are many missives that I have written in the past that may be of interest to the reader.

Be always well,

Dr. Jim