28th May 2021: Five weeks post op
So I was lying in bed, thinking about getting up. I am now post op....... five weeks since I had open heart surgery. Four things were done. One was a replacement heart valve, for which I have the paper receipt. Not sure what to do with a paper receipt if the new valve fails and I am rendered without life......too late then to have a refund.........! Three other repairs were made as well, one of which was some tubing made of cloth...... no receipt though. All good stuff, or it would be if I wasn't so beset with a weariness which is undermining to the soul. These are the thoughts I was having as I tried to raise myself up of the bed, an effort which took up to thirty minutes if my OH was not available for a 'haul me up' arm to act as a hoist.
Back in early March I had a phone call from my would-be surgeon, explaining in graphic detail about what would be done during my open heart operation ...... He mentioned the possible negatives, but said if all went well with the op then that I would be out of bed within two days, walking by five, and home within seven. Well that sounded OK. To my mind I would be up and jollying about on my life's pathway again toute suite...this is what I took from his phone call.
I was feeling no pain pre-op. However, post op ..... and I was fetched up in a completely different landscape, not only full of physical pain, but all sorts of other pain as well....emotional, psychological, physiological, and all sorts of other depressional pot holes as well. This was a landscape I thought I was never going to escape. Gone was my optimism for life, but worse still was my zest for life, ........I was rendered all in pieces, like a jigsaw puzzle with all the pieces jumbled up.
It is now the 16th June, three weeks after I started this blog, and eight weeks post op, and I am driving my husband mad, because my jigsaw puzzle pieces are now slotted back together and I am now in mid recovery although still tottery on my feet, huff and puff with my breathing sometimes, and my energy levels are still not up to maximum. Sometimes my mind feels ten steps ahead of my body, which has my husband frequently telling me to slow down and rest. But I am me, and I am feisty, so I argue back, but then feel guilty because he is right and only wants to look after me, bless him.
I can now walk 100 steps along the lane, but use a walking pole to stop me from tottering too much, but it is one hundred steps more towards recovery and the next chapter in our lives which will begin when we have finally found a home of our own and we can stop living out of boxes.
Bye for now,
Love and hugs,
Vx
