This is supposed to be a vacation. I was going to see my family, visit some friends, go camping and fish for the first time in years. I've actually done most of those things, but this vacation sucks. I was excited, I was happy, I was only planning on staying for nine days. Now, I'm not sure how I feel about anything, I'm going to be here for at least four or five months and I need surgery. What the f$#* just happened?
I have been living in South Korea for the past year and a half teaching English to kindergarten students. South Korea was/is wonderful. I fell in love with the country, culture, people and, more importantly, my new job. It turns out that I really love teaching. The first year passed too quickly. So, I resigned my contract and began a second year. Things were going so well; I had found new passions in rock climbing and teaching, I was thinking about staying for a third year, tentatively planning some extensive traveling through southeast Asia and enjoying all the time I spent with my new friends. I was very happy.
I came home this July to see my family for the first time in 18 months and to get a checkup with my doctor. I felt, and still feel, great. I'm in the best shape I've ever been in thanks to all the climbing I've done, but it didn't matter the checkup did not go well. I am on track for heart failure. That is a bad thing. My aortic valve is leaking, severely, because the valve is no longer able to close. Instead, it folds back into my heart and lets the blood that was jumped pumped out flow backwards back into my heart. It's called prolapse. This is now the way it's supposed to work. As a result of the prolapse, my heart is working too hard and has grown about a centimeter in the past year and a half from the extra exertion. The increase in size is what will lead to heart failure, as long as the problem persists my heart will continue to grow. The only solution is to replace the malfunctioning aortic valve.
For the third time in my life I am preparing for open-heart surgery and all the hard work, uncertainty and pain that comes along with it. I'm not excited about this, but I'm ready for it. I want to get this over with and get back to making plans and living my life. This is most certainly going to suck a lot. It's going to hurt and it's really f$#*ing up all my plans, but it's going to get better. Since I was born I've been facing problems like this and it's always gotten better.
I was born with a condition called Aortic Stenosis. Basically, my aortic valve was too small and a bit misshapen. As a result, my heart had to work harder to pump enough blood to my body and brain through the smaller opening. This overworking would have ultimately lead to heart failure from an oversized heart. As I was growing up I had a lot of restrictions put in place on the amount of physical activity I could do. That was a bummer, I had to quit little league because running the bases was too much exertion, but I was terrible at baseball and I found other things to do like math club, reading a lot, wearing tapered Wrangler Jeans and having a bowl cut for way too long. I had the problem fixed when I was 14 years old, in July of 1999, and I was in good health for the next 10 years. That was my first open-heart surgery.
In the fall of 2008 I decided I wanted to join the Peace Corps and started the long application process. Because of my medical history I needed to pass a few tests and get cleared by a cardiologist before the program would accept me. It seemed totally reasonable and I felt great, physically, so I made the appointments as soon as I could. During the first test I got some bad news. My aortic artery was dilated to over 5.5 centimeters; that's about 2 cm too big. I had an aneurysm. In the simplest terms possible, an aneurysm is a blood vessel that starts to expand and look like a bubble or balloon. As the bubble gets bigger, the wall of the blood vessel gets thinner and the chances of it breaking, or rupturing, become greater. The only way to fix such a problem is through surgery.
Because of the size and location of my aneurysm the doctor decided it was best if my activity level was reduced to "occasionally walking at a brisk pace for short periods." That meant I couldn't do anything but walk at a reasonable pace; no more running, no more hiking, no more swimming. Awesome! The reason for the restrictions was the fact that if my aneurysm were to rupture I would be dead before I even knew what happened. That's how quickly I would bleed to death. So, maybe the restrictions weren't so bad after all. I ended up using the free time to learn how to make beer, and now I have another fun hobby.
From the time I learned about the aneurysm it took about one year before the surgeon would operate because the risk of having the aneurysm needed to outweigh the risk of surgery. On August 27, 2009 I had my second open-heart surgery. Afterwards, I changed gears and got focused on teaching English in South Korea instead of the Peace Corps. It ended up being one of the best decisions of my life.
I don't have to wait a long time for this latest surgery. My surgeon is actually juggling his schedule and rearranging previous appointments to fit me in as early as possible. I get to solve this problem right away. I am very thankful for that. And, who knows, maybe my current setback will help me make the next "best decision" of my life. It doesn't hurt to hope.
