They just keep coming

It was very hard to say goodbye to Zoe this last Wednesday, April 4th. She kept saying she didn’t want us to go. I agreed with her. I didn’t want to go either.  

I’m extremely grateful for wonderful friends and family who have stepped in and taken care of Zoe, pets and our home while we were gone. 

We arrived Wednesday afternoon and settled into our room. The staff are wonderful and very accommodating. I had doctors on vacations calling me daily and taking as much time as I needed to talk. The medical staff who were on the floor caring for me took time to answer questions, checked on me regularly and made themselves available to me. I had a good nights sleep and was able to visit with a few friends and family members via text or phone calls. 

On Thursday, April 5th I ended up having my surgery much later than expected because of an emergency surgery and a delayed surgery before mine. Let’s just say I was originally scheduled for 1:00pm and ended up going in at 7:10pm. I was very hungry at that point.  I had many heart blocks while waiting in the hospital. The staff kept staring at me in disbelief. They kept asking if I feel them and how much they affect me. They kept telling other staff how they do not seem to bother me. During surgery I only experienced pain getting the art line placed in my right arm and a port placed on my neck. An art line was also placed in my right groin as well. I had two anesthesiologists working on me. They said they’d start the meds slowly and the next thing I knew everything was black and then I woke up in serious pain and the whole thing was done. They told me the surgery went well.  My stomach hurt and I had knots in my back so I wanted to roll to my right side. I kept asking if I could roll over and they’d say no I had to stay flat on my back for 6 hours because of the art line in my groin. I asked for Levi. He was brought to me and held my hand. I told him I wanted to go home. I was denied that too.  

The next morning, Friday, April 6th I started feeling better. I started taking pills and eating and those two things did not settle well. I ended up vomiting it all back up. My pain became really bad and we discovered that I had air pockets under my skin on my chest which caused more pain. I had a small panic attack because it felt difficult to breath because of all the pain. Thankfully by that evening we had my pain back under control. 

The Relief Society President from the Palo Alto First Ward sent over a sister who visited with me for a little bit. It was so nice to have a visitor. She asked if she could visit me again when I’m down for the transplant. I’m so excited to have a new friend in Palo Alto. 

On Saturday, April 7th I had a surprise visitor. My oldest brother, Stephen walked in. I was completely shocked. He was in town for the Comic Con event in San Jose and realized he was really close by Stanford. It was so nice to have a familiar face there. We had a nice visit. 

Here is an awesome picture of my wounds. Sorry if it makes your tummy queasy. The top vertical line is where my leads were put in and placed on the outside of my heart. My xiphoid was removed in order to do that. The bottom horizontal line is where the pacemaker generator was placed in a pocket on my abdomen. 

By the way, Levi is the best hospital buddy. He sits by my side and watches tv or plays on his phone without complaining. He also asks follow up questions and keeps track of everything for me. I may have been a little too loopy to remember everything. 

By Saturday afternoon I was realeased and we headed to the airport. The following picture shows exactly what I did at the airport and on the plane. I’m so thankful for Levi taking care of me and everything else. I was a hot mess. 

We got home late Saturday night and I fell asleep, while Levi put Zoe to bed, unpacked, and organized all my meds. I believe we were excited to enjoy the comfort of our own home. Sadly, the food and pills still did not settle well and I continued with the daily vomiting. I slept most of Sunday. 

Monday morning, April 9th I woke up at 3:00am with the same headache and discomfort I’ve had since I left Stanford, I decided to check my oxygen saturation. It was registering around 56-68. Not good. So I woke up levi and after calling Stanford’s after hours we were told to go to the hospital. A dear friend came over and sat with Zoe until she woke up and got her off to school. Levi and I went the the UofU in South Jordan. My oxygen levels came up by wearing oxygen and they were not confident in caring for me because they did not have a cardiology team there and decided to transport me to the downtown UofU. 

It’s taken me 37 years to be personally transported in an ambulance. I’m quite impressed that I made it this long. Levi followed us up and they quickly settled me into my room. 

It’s been a slow day. My sister and mom brought Zoe up to see me today. It was my favorite visit thus far. The staff checked my pacemaker and it’s working perfectly. It’s now 11:00pm and they’re going to do a CT scan of my abdomen. They have 3 trama patients in front of me. Tomorrow I will be getting an echo. They’re wondering if all my symptoms are aftermaths of surgery or something new. They’re concerned about my oxygen saturation dropping and coming back up with oxygen. They’re wondering if there is more problems with my lungs that we weren’t aware of. I’ll be staying the night in the hospital.