LIFE at Five Months after Open Heart Surgery

#HeartStrong 

On the 29th of this month will be the 5th month to date since my OHS. To recap, they bypass my blocked arteries with the saphenous veins in my legs, they done the sternotomy on my chest cut my breast bone in half, they harvest 3 veins on my left leg to bypass my three blocked arteries in the heart, they cleaned out my aortic arch, they harvest again an artery from the left side of my chest wall. What can I say? They hacked me up pretty good. 

Life has been s-l-o-w-l-y creeping back to 'normal' in the past 5 months whatever that 'normal' means nowadays. 

I have really good days when I move freely and I can accomplish a lot, physically (commuting just fine, cooking my own breakfast, a little house chores cleaning, light malling) and I have days when everything screams in pain: my chest, my back, my whole upper body, generally my hips. My left leg is still numb. Some days they aggravate me, and they feel swollen, and some days the pain is bearable, and they just feel like annoying needles poking me. There are night chills and cold sweats where my body is fighting an infection.

"Before bypass surgery, this used to be my life song, especially on the Christmas time last year." - DEMON HUNTER - The Wind

These city lights illuminate your breath

As you tell of all the ways that you feel dead

December left you cold and alone

I'm sorry but I have enough to fear on my own

Dying to care

I'm searching for some solace in this air

But the wind

It cuts to my bone

The wind

This hollow breath of cold

The snowflakes fall like ashes into dirt

Like every hope that rose and dissolved into hurt

Dying to care

I'm searching for some solace in this air

But the wind

It cuts to my bone

The wind

This hollow breath of cold

The wind

It cuts to my bone

The wind

In winter's arms, I feel at home

My blood pressure has inched itself up to close to normal values. Finally, I'm slowly recovering from hypotension the lowest BP I had is 81/55 which is considered very low and there was also my time when I got the lowest heart rate of 49. I was rushed to the emergency in the morning because of this and the doctors adjusted my medicines. Last time I took it, it was 110 over 70, so slowly getting the diastolic closer to 70 now (used to be in the 50s for months)

I am still not able to carry much weight but I can push grocery carts with my mother. Unloading and loading them from commuting is hard, so I can't do it my mother and my sister did this every time. I tried a couple of times and start panting like a dog.

My chest is very sensitive, still. My incision (full sternotomy) has keloids from space to space, and it's still very sensitive and bright red. Sun hurts it even more, so I cover it pretty carefully when I am outside. I have days when my drainage tube scars on my stomach are very touchy, as well, and sometimes itchy.

I went on a family trip overnight in Baguio City last April. The drive up there was about 5 and a half hours, and the time in the car bothered my ribs a bit in a wild turning of Baguio's zigzag road.

The trip was great, overall, but I did get very tired the one full day we were there, from walking around in the heat. There were destination spots that I can't go especially when climbing up so I just wait for them patiently until they come back. 

I have had a couple of episodes of feeling dizzy and feeling like my head is too heavy, where I have to sit down and rest a bit, but those are very rare now, maybe once a week or so, and they are very short lived. They usually come when I am extremely tired, after doing too much, or when I am in the heat. Thank God it's rainy season now. I used to like summer before but now I turned into a pluviophile emo trash person. Lol!

There are days when you feel very strong and there are days when you're really weak and drained out energy. But when I feel the weakness, I'll nap, sit on the couch, and just catch up on life.

Five months ago, or even 2 or 3 months ago, all this would not have been possible! I am amazed every day at what my body can do. I still get no warning about being tired. When I have the stamina (and that has improved amazingly over the past 5 months!), I just go-go-go and usually the following day, the tiredness hits and I have to just stop the show!

I sometimes lie awake at night thinking of my new parts inside of my heart, the saphenous veins harvested from my leg and the left internal mammary artery harvested on my chest wall. I am visualizing them, and imagining them at work, and praying and casting a small blessing on them, asking them kindly to keep working for me. Let the continuous blood flow work inside my heart and arteries. Do not block easily. It's kind of eerie what they can do nowadays. I am so grateful that I had something that could be fixed. There are so many hundreds of thousands of afflictions out there that are hopeless for so many people. For innocent babies and unborn children, even. I got lucky! I am also learning to trust them more and more and seeing them as part of me, and not a strange 'body' anymore.

 My recovery song #HeartofCourage

The one thing that open heart surgery has taught me so far, a very powerful thing, is just how much our hearts work. Right after surgery, when my poor heart was beaten up senseless, and so tired and so weak, for a month, everything, even breathing, walking up a flight of stairs very slowly, showering took a Herculean effort. Sitting up was an effort, for days and weeks. Putting my shoes on took forever, and it rendered me breathless. This is how I knew my heart was not ready to do all these things yet, it was still recovering. I never take any move of my body for granted anymore, because I know of the amazing hard work that goes into it from my heart. I am so thankful and so humbled!

The 'rhythm' of the past five months has been just 'one day at a time', and I continue to keep that stride. I never have two days alike, and every day teaches me new things about myself, and about this heart disease journey. As one of my favourite songs goes, "Mask of steel, silent words, Waiting till the coin has turned", so I'm happily carrying through until the coin has turned for me, for my time to feel fully recovered. This is a lucky journey. I have been cast on and eagerly waiting what is behind every corner, of every day.

I would also like to share this wonderful quote from my favourite Christian band, Demon Hunter:

"When the sun is shining in our lives, it's important to remember that it's raining down upon someone else. It can be difficult to truly see outside yourself - especially when everything seems to be coming up roses. When we suffer, we expect the world to stop and suffer with us... But when we're basking in the glow of good fortune, we're often blind to those whose lives are in turmoil. This is a reminder to myself, as much as anyone else, to be mindful at all times of the difficulties others face." - Ryan Clark

Always be kind to someone you don't know what storms someone has just walked through.

Much health to everyone, ALWAYS!