A month ago today, I had a mild heart attack. I experienced chest pain in the morning at work, and I ended up in the emergency room. A week later, I underwent a triple bypass, and five days after that, I came home to my wife and pups.
I'm so fucking happy to be here. Had I not gone to the ER, I probably wouldn't be.
It's not shocking to me that people, mostly men, ignore chest pain. When it happened to me, I was terrified, confused, and wanted more than anything for it to be indigestion or an anxiety attack. I was convinced it was right up until I got the results from my catheterization
Three arteries, two completely blocked, one ninety percent.
And I'd thought I felt fine right up until the chest pain. I even felt fine after.
But those five minutes of pain and discomfort changed my life. Saved my life, even.
So here I am, a month removed from the pain. I'm mending well. Nothing is perfect, but I feel better every day, and for the most part things are going according to the recovery plan. I'm able to walk for thirty minutes straight now, albeit at a slow pace, and I should be starting cardiac rehabilitation soon. I'm eating well and have lost twenty-two pounds since I left the hospital three and a half weeks ago. I would like to lose another thirty, but slow and steady wins the race.
I even got to enjoy a couple of glasses of wine this week. Nothing has ever tasted so good!
And I'm getting bored, which I take as a good sign. I was never bored in the hospital or for the first ten days I was home. Scared? Yes. Worried? Yes. Overwhelmed? Fuck yes!
I don't think you can be bored when you are in survival mode. I never was. I don't think I had the capacity for it.
How can you be bored when every little thing your body does is a question you need to ask the doctor about? Why is my chest creaking? Oh, that's normal? What about my blood pressure spikes? Also normal? And the bleeding from my chest tube wound that went on for two solid weeks? Normal? Oh, right, drainage.
I wish they had a list of all the things that could and would probably occur after open heart surgery that were normal. It would have saved me a lot of anxiety.
But yeah, I'm bored.
I'm still healing, and I have a long way to go. I have to take it slow. I have to get back in some kind of shape, and then surpass that and get in the best shape of my life. I want to take this moment and use it to make sure I get the most out of the rest of my life. I'm fifty years old, and if I can get another fifty years, I'll take every moment of it!
The funny thing about all this is the clarity. I always thought I was afraid of dying. I guess we all are. It's part of being human, right? We grow up and develop the knowledge through observation and experience that life is finite, that we will all die. It's the one thing we all have in common.
But I never appreciated life as much s I do right now.
How sad is that?
Fear of death as a vague future occurrence is one thing, and that's scary enough. Now that I've been through all this, fear of death has gained a reality that I've never before experienced.
I never knew what I feared before. Now I know.
It's not death that's scary and upsetting.
It's no longer living.
It's the realization that someday I'll stop spending time with my family and friends, stop snuggling my pups, stop reading and writing and speaking. Stop playing video games and eating and drinking and laughing and loving and smiling and crying and trying. Just stop.
It's not the dark specter of death that I'm afraid of anymore.
It's the loss of this beautiful, precious, amazing life.
I always liked the song, "Live Like You Were Dying," by Tim McGraw.
Now I really understand it.
I don't know how much time I have, but I know I'm above ground and more or less upright, breathing, smiling, and somewhat terrified. I know I love my family and friends and want to have as many moments with them as I can. I know I want to be healthy and make the best of every single day.
And, as always, I know I'm a writer.
Write, fool. Live, love, eat, drink, smile, weep.
Write,
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