Does a Day Go By You Don't Remember?

shop deals on amazon
Shop deals on ebay
Advertise with us
Valve Replacement Forums

Help Support Valve Replacement Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
J

Jkm7

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 15, 2005
Messages
4,384
Location
Massachusetts
After my first OHS, somehow I was able to put it behind me more and sometimes weeks would go by when I didn't think about the whole experience. After my second, nine months ago, not a day goes by I don't think of it.

Same for everyone else or do I just need more time? It's okay. I don't dwell on it and it doesn't debilitate me but I notice it is never really out of my mind for a full day.
 
I am now 8 months out and feel exactly the same way. I never gave it a second thought after my first surgery and have lived my life for 28 years since then without letting my heart condition play much of a part at all. Why is it now such a central part of our lives? I hate it. I'm waiting for the day when it slides back into the background again.

Kim
 
I'd like to forget, but too many things happen to me to make things life threatening and bringing it all to the forefront again.
 
Well, I guess I am often confronted with being a heart patient due to chronic a-fib and moderate CHF so my symptoms are daily irritants. However, they usually do not bring up memories of surgery. Not sure if this is what you meant. However, I am almost 15 years out from my last OHS so maybe time does make a difference.
 
It is hard to forget and we (I) may never forget, but we have to do our best to live at best we can...not to feel sorry nor any sorrow for what we have gone through...the contrary, to be grateful that medicine and God gave us another chance to stay around. Upon coming home, when my sister - out of good intention - said to me "soon you shall be normal again and forget all this", I got so upset and so hurt and my answer was: "I shall never be normal again, how can I be normal with non-normal valves?!" But I do not look at it the same way now after three months. I see the positive side in anything negative. So, I remember it everytime I look in the mirror, but I then remind myself I am healthier and better and still around those who love me...my heart was "broken" to save my life and to spare m family's hearts from being broken if such surgeries did not exist yet.:)

With prayers and a new hope with every new sunshine:)
 
I understand what your saying and not really did i intentenally think either

of my surgery,but nice things like the valve ticking reminded me and all the

good things of my first surgery,but i tell you we never forget at least i haven't.

Now since the valve clicks gone almost a year and second surgery is somewhere out in the wait,i do think about it more everyday.

Try to remember the yukky parts to prepare for 2nd surgery,kinda refresh
my memory,which will be refreshed in it's own time,no dought.
But i always dwelled on the click and enjoyed hearing it so much,that one
day it was gone and i realised it right away.
Thayt surgery was 16 years ago and i have never forgotten,but the valve click was my reminder each day to think about it and my reminder to thank God for the new day he gave me.

Now for some strange reason everytime i sign in i wanna type and i do type
zipper3:eek:instead of zipper2:rolleyes:........OH BOY:p

zipper2 (DEB)
 
zipper2 said:
................
But i always dwelled on the click and enjoyed hearing it so much,that one
zipper2 (DEB)
Click to expand...

Deb,

Those who know how scared and uncomfortable I was when I knew I would hear the tick tick tick, they find it strange when I tell them I turn my neck and head in a certain position in order to hear it...to remind myself I have a healthier valve and I really love the sound of the click--such a cute sound (I may sound crazy to some, but I really love it);):):p
 
I'm with you Eva. I also count my blessings everyday, that I'm alive. Yes, I do remember I'll never really ever forget, and I really don't want too.:)
Clicking is peaceful to my ears....
 
If it were not for the warfarin everyday and the testing I would not think about it....I don't think about the surgery but the maintenance that goes with it....but I guess that is a good thing ... keeps me remembering my meds and keeps me grateful:)
 
I have days when I don't think about it at all. It's the first thing that comes to my mind however if something doesn't feel right. For example if I'm dizzy I think could it be my valve?

 
I'm only 3 weeks out of surgery for my third. I don't remember my first I was only 2 years old. But with the little setbacks I have had I still think about it. It's probably just too fresh in my mind at this point. when I think of the 2nd surgery it makes me greatful to be alive.
 
Yes, of course, grateful to be alive and functioning and having a high quality of life is everything. I have immense gratitude for all my doctors and nurses and providers who guided me through the journey..... as well as the good folks here.

I was certainly grateful when I recovered from my first surgery and the whole accompanying emergency but the second was a different thing altogether for me.

Thank you all for your responses. They are very helpful to me in putting it all in perspective and remembering so many others have been through the same (and some, far more). It is good to keep in mind.

It's tough stuff no matter how 'easily and smoothly' it goes. The most perfect is still a huge trauma and assault on our bodies and our emotions IMO
 
Eva said:
It is hard to forget and we (I) may never forget, but we have to do our best to live at best we can...not to feel sorry nor any sorrow for what we have gone through...the contrary, to be grateful that medicine and God gave us another chance to stay around. Upon coming home, when my sister - out of good intention - said to me "soon you shall be normal again and forget all this", I got so upset and so hurt and my answer was: "I shall never be normal again, how can I be normal with non-normal valves?!" But I do not look at it the same way now after three months. I see the positive side in anything negative. So, I remember it everytime I look in the mirror, but I then remind myself I am healthier and better and still around those who love me...my heart was "broken" to save my life and to spare m family's hearts from being broken if such surgeries did not exist yet.:)

With prayers and a new hope with every new sunshine:)
Click to expand...

Eva, this is a beautiful response.:)
 
To answer the original question....Yes, on some level, I think about my situation every day.
Of course I'm on this site every day, and taking pills every day, which are 2 things I was not doing 3 yrs ago... I was too distracted just trying to breathe and stay alive.
 
marie said:
I have days when I don't think about it at all. It's the first thing that comes to my mind however if something doesn't feel right. For example if I'm dizzy I think could it be my valve?
Click to expand...

I basically feel the same way.
Like Cooker, if it wasn't for the warfarin and testing I no longer think about......unless my smart ass kid says "I can hear you tick" :D I reply "and that's a GOOD thing"
 
I would say that I too think about it every day (being addicted to lurking on this site might be a clue to why :rolleyes:) but not in a bad way at all. Like others, I am soooo thankful for what was done and in the fact that I live in an era where my surgery was possible.
 
When I had my first OHS 33 years ago, I knew my life would never be the same again. I would lie awake for hours listening to the clicking of my valves & wonder how long they'd go on clicking. I wondered too if the doctors had been truthful with me when they said that I had gotten a new lease on life & I would live for many years with my new valves.

And then, six months after my first surgery, when my first husband walked out on me, I thought for sure that he had left me because he knew something that I didn't & that it was just too painful for him to stick around & watch me slowly die. That's when I headed for my 2nd OHS --- all the stress & emotion on my newly patched heart had caused some of the sutures around my mitral valve to tear loose. But I survived, yet again!

I don't know exactly why I've been spared but I do know that OHS gave me a newly acquired awareness & appreciation for life like never before & I'm convinced that it help mold me into a better & stronger person & I'm ever so grateful for that!
 
Hmmm...interesting.

My first 2 surgeries ... I didn't think much about afterward. The first one was when I was a youngster (less than 5 years old); the second was when I was a teenager in middle school. I thought about it for a while after the 2nd one, but once things got "back to normal", I didn't.

BUT ... after my January 2003 surgery, I think about the experience often. So many intriguing memories around that time...and that is about the same time I "snapped out" of my anger/bitterness/sadness.....



Cort | 35swm | "Mr Monte Carlo"."Mr Road Trip" | pig valve.pacemaker ...RT 66 drive = Sept '09
WRMNshowcase.legos.HO.models.MCs.RTs.CHD = http://www.chevyasylum.com/cort
"When you kiss your little baby, you've kissed the face of God" ... Kenny Rogers/Wynonna ... 'Mary, Did You Know?'
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top