I found myself sitting in a hospital talking to a doctor:
Doc: You sure you haven’t had a heart attack?
Me: I’m pretty sure…..Wouldn’t I know?
Doc: Well……Yes and no.
It was a conversation I didn’t want to have but there I sat having it. I didn’t know this was going to turn into the longest January of my life.
I had walked into the Emergency room with a few off the wall problems 3 days before Christmas. One thing led to something else. There were scars on my heart. Another check and I had a leaky heart valve. Maybe 2. I felt fine. I can’t be sick.
Back in September I caught covid twice. The second covid infection seemed to never leave. Every week I felt a bit slower. I couldn’t sleep. One doctor thought I have pneumonia. I took a lot of medicine and nothing worked. December hit and I was convinced I had long Covid. By the end of December I dragged myself into the Emergency room.
As I sat in the hospital, I watched a team of Cardiac Doctors build a profile of my issues. Turns out I had what I can only describe as genetic heart disease. My heart was wrecked. Why at 53 was this coming up? Covid. Covid slowed me down enough to expose the symptoms and let them grow.
On January 7th I had open heart surgery. I was out for 2 or 3 days. By out they decided that I needed to sit on a ventilator to let my body start the healing process. I guess you could call it a coma. When they woke me my first words were “Holy crap I ‘m not dead”.
On January 6th I decided this might be it. How do you face death at 53? Well – I’d be asleep. If I did die I wouldn’t have one of those dramatic ends where I reach for the sky and breath my last breath. Dead. That’s it. I fired off emails to a few friends. Ask everyone to forward them around. I anointed one friend as the keeper of my bitwarden account. He could at least start shutting down accounts. I didn’t want anyone to see me for years to come on Facebook or LinkedIn just hovering like a ghost from Christmas past.
I’m alive though and basically I have a new Holiday in my existence of January 7th 2025. You could call it a second birthday. Maybe a second shot at life.
