Sorry to not be posting much. It's not because I don't feel good or things aren't going bad, rather that things are going quite well and I was working on a very long post (and that is me saying that) and thought... Nah.
So here's a quick update.
One week ago, I should probably have gone home from the hospital, so I'm going with one week home. 11 days ago I had surgery. Not even two weeks. And this could not have been a more different experience for me than before, and I considered that a pretty good recovery at the time.
What's different?
First off, mental state. Last time I was struggling with terrible dreams (I still have stress dreams, but more of the "I was so mad that I'd broken my iPhone that I smashed my iPad Pro" type). No huge adrenaline surges like before, although there were a couple of same "aha!" moments that preceded them. I'm not in the least afraid to sleep.
Second, and this really covers a lot of territory, I have been through all of this so I knew what to expect. Kind of. You hear this sort of thing all the time, like "don't chase the pain" and "One day at a time" but this one is very true - Every recovery is different. It's a little like the difference between the first time you play any piece of music and the first time you play something different, now you know there will be notes but the way your hands move provides a lot of commonality to build on. By far the biggest gain here was diet and exercise, not to mention the blood thinner regimen. All of those things took months to internalize, now they aren't even on the radar. That gives a lot of brain space for other things.
Third, I was not at all prepared for either a) how good of shape I was in, especially for my age, and b) how large of a factor that would be in recovery. I have never thought of myself as being in good shape, other than a brief period in my late 20's that was more about body building than fitness per se. Now I'm realizing that I was in the shape of my life, and perhaps of many people's lives. It just took a recovery like this to make me realize how important being in very good shape is. If I was talking to a person going into valve replacement, I would strongly recommend they do whatever exercise and change their diet as appropriate before surgery.
And, I cannot stress this enough, much of the time you are not going to know you need surgery until you need surgery. Or you won't be able to get into shape easily. My mitral valve issue was a limiting factor on my exercise, so much so that I spent a good part of the last four months winding down. Had I not been in the good shape ahead of time, this would be a much different recovery.
So where am I at?
Yesterday, Mel and I walked the length of Washington Square Mall and back. Not at "mall mode" speed, but fast for a guy ten days out of major surgery.
My chest incision looks more like a bad scratch than anything else. Nearly every other hole in my body, and there are a few, other than the groin incision (which, admittedly, does look Frankensteinian, but then it covers a portion of skin that gets bent quite a bit in a given day) and the drainage tube holes, which just look like big scabs.
Aside from lifting and bending tasks, such as laundry, putting/taking dishes into/out of the dishwasher, and walking on sloping elevations, I am largely self sufficient. [Edit: And since I began this entry, I walked a couple of blocks on sloping elevation outside, which is awesome because walking in circles inside the house sucks.]
I still have a sore core, but nothing like last time. I could barely sit in a chair for a good month, and then only on my computer desk chair. Now I sit on sofas and upholstered chairs regularly. I even sit and stand using solely my core and leg muscles with minimal effort.
Part of this has also been fortunate timing or good planning. Buying the 84th Ave house couldn't have come at a better time. No more taking five minutes to get down the stairs only to realize you'd forgotten something upstairs you need. That happened five or six times a day. I've only done set of steps at a bloodwork lab yesterday where we couldn't find the elevator (we barely found the lab!), so I can do it if I need to, but I'd rather focus on less stressful options. I've also found that "practicing" the things I'd need to remember doing (like standing up and down, or showering to avoid direct spray on incisions) has made it easy to do them right now that I need them.
The craziest thing, and for those keeping track from last time, is my attitude toward opiates. I was very concerned about addiction before, now I am not at all. The biggest mind shift is that if you are in pain and waiting to take the next dose, then you are psychologically "rewarded" for taking the pill. If you aren't in pain, and just take it because it's time, that doesn't happen. This both makes complete sense but is so counterintuitive all at once. As a result, I am dosing as recommended, planning on tapering off as things heal up, and expect to be off of these things before the end of the month.
Now, what I need to do is start sleeping through the night. That said, nap time. I'll probably post in a few days to a week if I have new things to report.
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