The last week of June 2005 and I was scheduled for Monday morning heart surgery. I got through all the pre-op stuff (including blood drawing - and I hate needles) and surgery prep the week before. The night before surgery my wife and I stayed in a room the hospital rents for heart-patients' families so they can be nearby the hospital. I don't either of us got much sleep that night - worrying about the next day. I guess for me, though, it was not so bad - I'd be out for most of it. In the morning just as the son was coming up, they wheeled me into surgery, stuck me about three times in the arm to get the IV and anastesia going, and then it was off to la-la-land. I didn't wake up until eight hours later in recovery, very much out of it for quite some time late into that evening.
My wife, my parents and my in-laws were able to visit me in ICU that night. They couldn't stay long but I most likely wasn't a lot of company anyway. With all the tubes, monitors and such - I probably looked like a science experiment (felt like one at times too). I really didn't feel too concerned about much but sleeping anyway until early Tuesday morning. Then realization of things kind of started to sink back in.
They got me to a room on Tuesday around noon. I was actually feeling hungry at this point, a good sign. But, it's crawl before walk you know. Start with ice chips, then liquids if those stayed down. Oh, but the walking would come very soon. By late that evening, I was ready for my wife to help me take my first walk around the ward.
After that, it was going down the checklist of all the things you have to do (or get done) before you can be released. Man, that couldn't come fast enough as far as I was concerned. When they have to come in every two hours and prick your finger to check your blood, you start to run out of fingers fast. Did I tell you I hate needles? Yeah, I did. Even those quick little ones. By Thursday noon they felt I was ready to head home, and I totally agreed. The TV viewing options stunk in the hospital, as did the food. I've never been a hospital fan anyway - ever since my first stay in one as a kid when I was four years old.
Because the surgery was non-evasive (using lapriscopic tools to repair my broken valve and to put a ring in my heart), they didn't have to crack open my rib-cage. Instead I had three or four smaller incisions for them to get in and do what they had to do. That's good because cracking the rib-cage usually means two months recovery where as what I had done meant a much quicker recovery time. The bad news is the lapriscopic is supposed to be more painful initially - but I didn't see that (or I honestly suppressed a lot of it). I plowed through my mandatory pain pills as fast as needed (did I tell you that I hate taking pills? And these were the horse variety - huge!) but I hardly used the ones they prescribed for after getting home. I guess I was really motivated to recover and move on.
Being home certainly helped as well (home is way better than any old hospital). I got to recline in the family room for most of the daytime - catching up on DVD's or working on my laptop (or just napping). My wife made sure I had my pills, any water I might need, had good food, etc. By the time I was home for a week, we were up to walking a mile at a shot (they want you to get your exercise level up to help your heart get strong again). By the end of the second week after surgery, my wife was able to go to the office for a few hours to work (rather than working from home).
Oh, and back to the job front - I called them back after I was home and told them I was still interested. Since I was not allowed to drive for nearly a month after my surgery (and really wasn't to be in the car for super long stretches of time - the combination of sitting too long and the seatbelt weren't comfortable), they agreed to meet us halfway for a second interview (the job location was three hours across the state). We were still in the car coming back home from that interview when the person I was talking to all the while asked if we would up for arranging an in-office interview for the end of July. Needless to say, I was very excited and said yes. We did that third interview at the end of the month (my wife driving me, of course - that allowed her to check out the area should I take the job).
Once I visted my cardiologist in the beginning of August and he cleared me for returning to work, I went back to my first employer and finished my last few days. I then was able to accept the offer from my interviewer so I could start working for them. By the end of August, they had me set up in temporary housing while we started the whole relocation process (they would help us sell our home and would move all of our stuff as well as part of the hiring package). My wife finished up a few things with her job, got the house ready to be shown with the realtors, and then she and my son moved as well in late October.
As for my heart - now two years later, all is well. I had my annual visit with a cardiologist on Tuesday of this week. He said the echosonagram done that day showed the same as last year - meaning everything still looks great. So other than the usual watching of the diet and getting in some exercise to lose a few pounds, I'm good for another year.
Showing posts with label heart surgery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label heart surgery. Show all posts
Friday, August 17, 2007
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Affairs of the Heart pt 2
Okay, so here we are the end of May 2005, I know I need major heart surgery to repair my leaky mitral valve and I just find out I'm going to have a lot less insurance coverage in 30 days (not to mention having to find another job). This combination is enough to shake my usually optimistic point of view to the very core.
Luckily, my wife is very level-headed and came up with a plan. Per the company's policy, I could apply for short-term disability if my surgery got scheduled before my last day of work. In short, this would actually delay my final work day out until after surgery and recovery, if everything could get scheduled. We talked to my cardiologist, met with the surgeon who had to run a couple other tests first (like this one where they give you something to put you into an awake and totally relaxed but forgetful state and then they have you 'swallow' this thin tube with camera on the end so they can take pictures from actually inside your heart - the whole thing took like twenty minutes but other than a slightly scratchy throat I didn't recall a single thing! funky!), and were lucky to get the surgery scheduled for the Monday which would have been my last week of work. I notified the HR folks at the company and got the short-term disability approved. That allowed for one relief - having the insurance coverage for my surgery and recovery time. I would come back after the month or so recovery period to work out my final days. That helped a lot.
So, while juggling all this into place, I was also working up my resume (I had not done one since I left college in 1987 so I was a little rusty) and sending it out as job leads popped up. Now, I had worked my entire career up to this point in a very specific computer field - retail programming. That was good in that it made me sort of an expert with lots of experience. That was bad in that being specialized like that likely meant we might have to move, if I wanted to stay in the field I had worked. We had a number of discussions about this, both my wife and I and as a family involving my son. In the end, we deemed it best to be as flexible as possible. If a job option came up, we'd consider moving from Wake Forest.
Now, someone must have been looking out for me during all of this chaos. At the end of the second week of June, I happened upon a job listing at an online site for computer industry jobs. A retailer was seeking someone with skills in the products I had worked on for all these years. They were seeking someone with three or four years experience; I had quadruple that. I shot the resume off electronically on Saturday morning. Sunday evening I got a call back from someone regarding it. On Tuesday I was talking then with the recruiter that the employer worked through, and we had a phone screening interview set up for a week later. I expected that interview to go for maybe twenty minutes, but it went more like an hour and a half. I had all my interview prepartion materials scatter about the room and was able to pace a bit to relax as we talked. I think that helped a lot, and the interview went very well.
This was right about the time we finished the pre-surgery tests, and I got a surgery date scheduled just after that first interview. Now I was in the fun position to tell this potential new employer, for whom the job and company profile was a perfect fit for me, that I would be out of commission for the next month or so. Knowing that honesty is the best policy, I laid it all on the line to the recruiter and the person who interviewed me - and I was lucky that they were willing to wait for the right candidate! I just needed to contact them after my surgery so we could continue the interview process if I was still interested.
Whew! One heavy burden slightly lightened. It was good to have something new and exciting as a possible goal post-surgery. Now I just had to face the surgery itself. I had, in truth, pushed all the fear about having my heart operated on into the back of my mind when I was facing the whole unemployed issue. And, of course, I was putting on the brave face especially for my young son so he wouldn't worry. But, truth was, I was very scared about the whole thing.
(to be concluded tomorrow)
Luckily, my wife is very level-headed and came up with a plan. Per the company's policy, I could apply for short-term disability if my surgery got scheduled before my last day of work. In short, this would actually delay my final work day out until after surgery and recovery, if everything could get scheduled. We talked to my cardiologist, met with the surgeon who had to run a couple other tests first (like this one where they give you something to put you into an awake and totally relaxed but forgetful state and then they have you 'swallow' this thin tube with camera on the end so they can take pictures from actually inside your heart - the whole thing took like twenty minutes but other than a slightly scratchy throat I didn't recall a single thing! funky!), and were lucky to get the surgery scheduled for the Monday which would have been my last week of work. I notified the HR folks at the company and got the short-term disability approved. That allowed for one relief - having the insurance coverage for my surgery and recovery time. I would come back after the month or so recovery period to work out my final days. That helped a lot.
So, while juggling all this into place, I was also working up my resume (I had not done one since I left college in 1987 so I was a little rusty) and sending it out as job leads popped up. Now, I had worked my entire career up to this point in a very specific computer field - retail programming. That was good in that it made me sort of an expert with lots of experience. That was bad in that being specialized like that likely meant we might have to move, if I wanted to stay in the field I had worked. We had a number of discussions about this, both my wife and I and as a family involving my son. In the end, we deemed it best to be as flexible as possible. If a job option came up, we'd consider moving from Wake Forest.
Now, someone must have been looking out for me during all of this chaos. At the end of the second week of June, I happened upon a job listing at an online site for computer industry jobs. A retailer was seeking someone with skills in the products I had worked on for all these years. They were seeking someone with three or four years experience; I had quadruple that. I shot the resume off electronically on Saturday morning. Sunday evening I got a call back from someone regarding it. On Tuesday I was talking then with the recruiter that the employer worked through, and we had a phone screening interview set up for a week later. I expected that interview to go for maybe twenty minutes, but it went more like an hour and a half. I had all my interview prepartion materials scatter about the room and was able to pace a bit to relax as we talked. I think that helped a lot, and the interview went very well.
This was right about the time we finished the pre-surgery tests, and I got a surgery date scheduled just after that first interview. Now I was in the fun position to tell this potential new employer, for whom the job and company profile was a perfect fit for me, that I would be out of commission for the next month or so. Knowing that honesty is the best policy, I laid it all on the line to the recruiter and the person who interviewed me - and I was lucky that they were willing to wait for the right candidate! I just needed to contact them after my surgery so we could continue the interview process if I was still interested.
Whew! One heavy burden slightly lightened. It was good to have something new and exciting as a possible goal post-surgery. Now I just had to face the surgery itself. I had, in truth, pushed all the fear about having my heart operated on into the back of my mind when I was facing the whole unemployed issue. And, of course, I was putting on the brave face especially for my young son so he wouldn't worry. But, truth was, I was very scared about the whole thing.
(to be concluded tomorrow)
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Affairs of the Heart pt 1
In February of 2005, just a few weeks before my 40th birthday, I went and had a physical per my wife's concerned request. Now, I hadn't had a physical in a number of years prior to that - I've always been the type of person who was for the most part very healthy. A cold here or some allergies there but that was about it. So, I went to the family practice and had the usual done (height, weight, blood pressure, oil change, tire rotation...oh, wait, that's not right). While listening to my heart, the nurse practitioner heard a slight murmur. He asked if I was ever told I had a murmur. I said no. When the doctor came in, he heard it too and suggested that perhaps I should go see the local cardiologist for an echosonagram, just to be safe. It could be nothing.
I had my echo done on Valentines Day (which I found rather ironic - having your heart examined on February 14th). The cardiologist wasn't going to be able to review my results that day so I was asked to come back late the following week. Turns out that was on my 40th birthday, and it turned out that the murmur was not just nothing.
The murmur was actually caused by a condition called mitral valve regurgitation. That's a fancy way of saying one of my heart chambers did not seal properly after blood came into it before being pumped out to the body again - and that caused some blood to leak back. It also meant my heart was possibly working harder than it needed to get the job done. They had no idea how long the condtion existed. I could have been born with it, or it could have developed in recent years. My father joked that maybe that's why I was never good at running track (okay, I wasn't good at track - he was right - but then again he's the one I inherited my heart issues from, the man who had triple bypass surgery about four or five years prior).
Surgery would be needed to correct it, but because the condition was not so severe we had the option of scheduling when it would be convenient. In the meantime, they'd prescribe something so that my heart wouldn't have to work so hard. Since surgery meant a couple months recovery, I wanted to schedule it to fit in with schedules at my work and my wife's (since she'd want to take time off while I recovered). We also had a Disney Cruise with my in-laws, my brother-in-law and his wife and their boys scheduled for May, so I didn't want to be incompacitated for that. We decided summer would work best for all involved, and I went ahead and alerted my manager in early March of what was going on.
Well, we did the trip in May and all was going fine. Then the other shoe dropped: my big international employer whom I had been with for 17 1/2 years was doing layoffs to help cut on expenses. Over 200 people in the various business operating out of the campus in NC were slated on the list (a 5% cut across the whole company worldwide). I was unfortunately one of the people they had decided to let go. I found this out late in May, and the end of June would be my last day. As if my heart (and head) needed any more, eh?
(to be continued tomorrow)
I had my echo done on Valentines Day (which I found rather ironic - having your heart examined on February 14th). The cardiologist wasn't going to be able to review my results that day so I was asked to come back late the following week. Turns out that was on my 40th birthday, and it turned out that the murmur was not just nothing.
The murmur was actually caused by a condition called mitral valve regurgitation. That's a fancy way of saying one of my heart chambers did not seal properly after blood came into it before being pumped out to the body again - and that caused some blood to leak back. It also meant my heart was possibly working harder than it needed to get the job done. They had no idea how long the condtion existed. I could have been born with it, or it could have developed in recent years. My father joked that maybe that's why I was never good at running track (okay, I wasn't good at track - he was right - but then again he's the one I inherited my heart issues from, the man who had triple bypass surgery about four or five years prior).
Surgery would be needed to correct it, but because the condition was not so severe we had the option of scheduling when it would be convenient. In the meantime, they'd prescribe something so that my heart wouldn't have to work so hard. Since surgery meant a couple months recovery, I wanted to schedule it to fit in with schedules at my work and my wife's (since she'd want to take time off while I recovered). We also had a Disney Cruise with my in-laws, my brother-in-law and his wife and their boys scheduled for May, so I didn't want to be incompacitated for that. We decided summer would work best for all involved, and I went ahead and alerted my manager in early March of what was going on.
Well, we did the trip in May and all was going fine. Then the other shoe dropped: my big international employer whom I had been with for 17 1/2 years was doing layoffs to help cut on expenses. Over 200 people in the various business operating out of the campus in NC were slated on the list (a 5% cut across the whole company worldwide). I was unfortunately one of the people they had decided to let go. I found this out late in May, and the end of June would be my last day. As if my heart (and head) needed any more, eh?
(to be continued tomorrow)
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