Tag Archives: open heart surgery

Fingers and Toes Crossed: The end of Jane’s no good very bad year.

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This story has gone too far. There are too many plot crises. It is, simply, unbelievable.

I’ll try to do this quick. In November 2023, it became apparent I would require heart surgery. My heart was damaged by radiation treatment I received to cure cancer I was diagnosed with in my 40s. As they prepared for surgery and did all of their tests, they discovered my lungs were also damaged by the same radiation treatment. I had lung cancer. Given the state of my heart, they couldn’t operate on my lung and vice versa. It took a while for the medical team to figure out a safe way to move forward. (In fact, for a short time, I was told that there was no safe way to move ahead, nor would they if they didn’t think I would live two years. I spent several weeks believing nothing could be done.) Fast forward: open heart surgery to repair one of my valves in March 2024 and lobectomy in early May. Two back to back major surgeries. Another valve would have to be repaired, but that was “in the future.”

The future came fast. My recovery peaked in August. The second valve was failing and on January 16, 2025, I had a second open heart surgery to replace the second valve. Then, the unthinkable: they had to go back in and fix a problem that happened in that surgery. A week later, I had another sternotomy. This surgery did not have to touch my heart, but had to be done. Trust me: I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t have to. That was Saturday. Now it’s Wednesday. I’m sitting up beside my bed. Typing.

It’s a miracle I’m alive. I’m going to settle for that now. Thank you to everyone who has kept me alive and a special thanks to all the friends and loved ones near and far who have kept me in their thoughts. Every time, I felt the Operating Rooms positively crowded with your good vibes. It helped.

Here’s the really wild part: This is not my story; it’s a story I keep getting pulled into. I hope it is ready to let go now. I have things to do, words to write, a garden to grow, a bike to ride, people to love.

A photo I took along Dallas Rd. In YYJ. The Straight is in the background but the real star of the show is the dark and moody sky.

Moody Sky

A Heart Too Open

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I’ve been in my health crisis for over a year now. I think it was November 2023 that I learned for certain I would need heart surgery. So much has happened since then, even I can hardly remember it all. Soon I will have a second open heart surgery. It’s getting closer.

For weeks now, I have thought my surgery was imminent. It needs to be soon. But then it is not. I get slower. I try not to alarm anyone so I say I am like an old turtle. This is not a frightening image. But I am getting anxious. I have felt this way before and I know what this is.

As time goes by, the term “open heart surgery” becomes literal. My heart is too open. I feel too much. Everything is sharp. Especially words. After all, I’m still a word girl. This morning, I read the phrase “bed blocker” used to refer to elderly, vulnerable patients in hospital awaiting long term care. How awful is that? Truly heinous. This is how frail people are viewed? I guess so. This is, therefore, how I am viewed. I am a wrench thrown into the machine, an ailing human screwing up the system, a scheduling problem.

People don’t understand the liminality that illness brings. They can’t fathom vulnerability if they’ve always been well. They fear suffering more than anything, believing it will be unendurable. They cannot imagine joy can break through. So they turn away. First from suffering, then from any pain at all, then from discomfort and eventually even from mere inconvenience. I understand. To be inconvenienced is one step closer to discomfort, one step closer to pain, and one step closer to suffering. They want a buffer. This is how I have come to understand ableism. It’s part of the buffer. When I see it this way, I can forgive people’s ableism. But that doesn’t mean I don’t expect people to do better.

We are all human. We are all frail. We are all vulnerable. Suffering is inevitable. It is as inevitable as joy.

I’ll write again in a few months. Meanwhile, I’ll be attuned to joy. I hope you will be too.