Waiting Room

Today, I write from a hospital waiting room, a place that has become very familiar to me in the past twelve years.  On May 30, 1999, my then forty three year old husband suffered a heart attack.  The following year was a nightmare as we dealt with one setback after another.  He went through probably six additional heart cath's in that first year alone as chest pain was a constant for him.  In July, his heart rate was only thirty beats a minute so he had a pacemaker installed.  It helped, but within a couple months they realized that one of the leads had apparently not attached the way it should and was not firing properly, so they put an extra one in.  This, along with the usual trial and error to get the right medicine combination and dosage that accompanies a heart patient's recovery made for a memorable year to say the least!

After we got through that first year, things got better and people who do not know him would never guess he is a heart patient.  He has a very physical job and can do work that a lot of guys his age can no longer do. A year ago, after an episode of feeling bad, we went to his cardiologist for a check up and he didn't come back home for ten days and when he did, it was to recover from a triple by-pass.  I was SO grateful we got him to the doctor before it was too late, the cardiologist's said he probably wouldn't have lasted much longer as he was almost 100% blocked in three arteries. We expected him to feel better than he had in a long time, and I did thrill to the fact that he could go on long walks with me at a good clip and not have to stop, bend over, grab his chest, and catch his breath.  He complained though, that he still didn't feel good.  He said he was still waiting for that "Wow!" factor everyone said he would experience.  Several times a day, for no apparent reason, he would suddenly feel very weak and dizzy.  Call's and visit's to the doctor were met with questions like are you getting enough rest, are you drinking enough water, are you getting up too quickly, and so on.  On two different occasions he passed completely out and fell to the ground.  The first time was out at his shop when I wasn't around but the second time I was.  It is just a little disconcerting when you are at a garage sale with the love of your life and he kills over between a freezer and a doll house.  Luckily no one else noticed, I helped him up, we got in our vehicle, I called the doc and said we have got to figure out what is causing this because THIS IS NOT NORMAL!!!  Since we were already in town, they had us come right over.  Eventually it was discovered that one of his pacemaker leads is bad and when he moves a certain way it shorts completely out.

So here we are, having his entire system replaced.  They are going to replace it with a pacemaker/defibrillator so if his heart ever goes into cardiac arrest it'll shock the heck out of him and he'll keep on ticking!  I like that!  In order to replace everything, including all three leads, they will use a special machine that fits around the leads and using a laser, will cut all of the scar tissue away from them all the way down to his heart, and then they will unscrew the lead out of his heart tissue and replace them with new ones.  He and I have been through a heart attack, a dozen heart cath's, a triple by-pass, a pacemaker installation, pacemaker battery upgrade, a hernia repair, knee surgery and a few other misc hospital stays, but this is a new one, and I'll admit, I'm a little scared.  We both know it probably is nothing compared to the by-pass we went through a year ago, but we are still apprehensive.  I mean, how much trauma can one heart take?!  One of our fears is that if there are any complications they will have to split him open again.  He has kept the most wonderful upbeat additude through all of this, but I think that having to go through that again when he just recovered from the first go round would be enough to send his spirit crashing to the depths.  I sure will be glad when they step out here and say it is all done and everything went well.

 Thank goodness for kids who put their lives on hold to come and support their parents through these trying times.  I have Kristi and her boys, Karen, grandaughter Lexi, Stacie, and Kyle all here with me and I know the other two are praying.  It helps keep my mind off of the "what if's" that will raise their ugly heads during the next four - five hours. Those darn things sure came to visit me a lot this past week. As long as it was daytime and I had work to do, worries stayed away.  But, as is the case with everyone, at night, when I would wake up, worries became monsters and imagination ran wild.  I would snuggle up to Mark and wonder if this was my last week to have him.  Knowing it was a silly thought, but unable to put it out of my mind enough to go back to sleep, I would pray.  I asked Jesus to please keep him safe for me, to guide the doctor's hands, to give me many more years with this wonderful man.  And He would calm me, I slept again, waking the next day with the monsters at bay once more, until the next middle of the night.  Today turned into tomorrow, into the next day and into the next until here I am, waiting once again for a man in a white coat to come out and tell me that my soul is intact, my life is worth living, my world is still turning and my sun still shines.