Dec 31: End of 2007 musings

It's 6:40 pm on New Year's Eve. I just got up from a >1 hr nap, have to throw together a salad for 15 people, get dressed and drive to a friend's house. As usual, I left this to the last minute. But I wanted to do one last posting for 2007, because it has been such a monumental year in so many ways: good, bad, whatever and unknown.

It has been a tumultuous year. I made the decision to sell my beautiful big townhouse and downsize to a smaller house with a rental unit. While there are many factors in that statement that I am unhappy about, the huge positive is that it will enable me to survive financially. If I can return to work 30 hours or more a week, then it will open up major possibilites for me: saving enough to allow me financial security in the future, hopefully return to traveling again. 2007 contained the emotional upheavel of hearing I needed a third surgery, which hit me harder than the other two combined. There is just something so wrong about the phrase "third open heart surgery". I still get choked up when I say it. But, whatever happens, that was the last heart surgery. What's done is done. Either I continue to improve and can take more of my life back or this is what I have to work with and adjustments will have to be made to that fact.

As long term readers will know, I looked at each physical problem by relating it to the absolute worst issue, which was reached after the first surgery. Bluntly, when my chest was so torn up that I couldn't even manuever enough to wipe my own butt. That, for me, was the lowest of the low, rock bottom. So, putting things in perspective, nothing else physically was quite as bad as that. From a combination of horrid life events, this spring will be the bottom of the heap: coping with the news of a third surgery, being in heart failure, constantly fatigued, still in pain, having to admit defeat by giving up the Ambler house, cope with all the accumulated stuff in the house (a lot of it relative's and not mine, in my defense), supervise the renovations at the new house with Willard's heart attack in the middle of things, juggle the financial issues that renovations cost (and, of course, how much over budget it was) while continuing to work three days a week and pass for a responsible, caring practitioner. Yup. That was the pits. That is now the touchstone for just how bad it can be.

A huge blessing that I haven't mentioned for a while are the wonderful people at Brigham, especially Drs Kenneth Baughman and Lawrence Cohn. Unlike when I encountered problems after the first surgery they believed me and kept looking and discussing until they found the problem. There is no one else in the world but Dr. Cohn that I would have trusted to again cut my chest open, stop my heart and put it together while fixing the pieces.

I want to thank those who kept me sane and allowed me to get through all that: Brenda, "Aunt" Beth, Mom, Kevin, J.T., my realtors Steve & Jane Dalton, Ellen, Barbara and Bill from BuxMont, Alice (who took such great care of the cats), Bill the porch contractor. Special award to Willard, who did such a great job with the renovations, going above and beyond a contractor or friend expectations despite his health issues. (Is there anyone else who would have been discharged from the hospital after a heart attack and gone directly to the house to do a "few" things?!?!? I don't think so! ) And my bosses at Marple Medical who have continued to provide health insurance and the knowledge that I always had a job; dealing with getting on disability and Medicare would have been beyond my coping skills.

But on looking back at everything, there is one person who stands out the most: Joanne. She spent uncountable hours packing the house, adjusted her schedule, all but deserted her husband and two kids, came with me to Boston for the cardiac cath and TEE, was here several times a week at the new house getting me settled and unpacked, and came to (tearfully!) greet me as soon as I came home--on her birthday no less--with flowers. She continued to come every Monday after work to help out with the myriad of obstacles that being post-surgical presents. Right up until her father was in the hospital for five weeks getting treated for his cancer. Honestly and truly, I would not have survived without her friendship and support.

After the main goal for 2008 (not getting my chest cut open and my heart stopped again), there are several other things I'm shooting for. Losing weight in the hopes of more energy, finding out how much I can regain physically, figuring out finances, and maybe--just maybe--traveling somewhere.

Thanks to all of you for checking in on me. Wishes to all for a terrific and healthy 2008 for all.

Laurie ( mechanically enhanced!)