Well, It's Time

PHOTO: Happy listening to the Wanamaker Organ

My surgery is tomorrow. It's been a long time coming. People often ask me "how do you feel?" Or they ask "how are you handling this?" Or, "how do you keep your spirits up, stay positive?" I usually respond that I feel fine and that having a wonderful husband, pets and a great life keeps me positive.

Dan points out that this whole thing, finally getting to the point of needing surgery, hasn't happened the way we thought it would. We figured I'd get progressively weaker and symptomatic, and that one day I would collapse like a friend did when his aortic valve went bad. But that didn't happen in my case. I think of my experience as more than a little surreal. This is because, with the exception of my serious episode last December 9 and a few lesser episodes over the moths and years, I usually feel just fine with minimal symptoms. I can still lift heavy things, walk five to six miles a day, and in short, do just about everything I want. I get a little winded once in a while climbing steps, but other than that I feel perfectly normal. So yes, it feels like I'm in some sort of surreal dream wherein I'm fine, a dream that never ends ... but I have to get this heavy duty operation anyway, that will rob me, (hopefully only temporarily,) of the strength and conditioning that I've worked so hard to maintain into my senior years.

There's a hill that I climb every day on my morning walk on my way back to the house. I've always said to myself that the day I can't climb this hill will be the day that I need to have surgery. But that's not the way it worked out. I can still climb the hill today but I won't be able to do it (for a while) after surgery. So now I say to myself, the day that I'm able to once again climb that hill...that will be the day when I'll feel recovered.