Update on Recovering

Today, I am roughly at a month and 2 weeks from my heart surgery. In some ways, I am looking back and I cannot believe how far I have come (I am not in a hospital bed, wired and attached to machines with everyone doing everything for me), and in some ways, I cannot believe I am still recovering and re-learning to do the easiest things daily (like putting on my socks and shoes).

A month and two weeks is hardly enough to get back to who you were before – I have learned this every day since then. One of the Rehab Center techs told me my body “was assaulted like never before” during this surgery, and trust me – this is exactly how it feels.

I still go through the pictures of all the scars and wounds and bruises I left the hospital with, just to remind myself what I am pulling myself from and to encourage me that change is happening and I am doing better. Some days, the hard ones, it is hard to remember this.

I have found a routine for my recovering weeks, and it usually goes like this:

• during the week, I wake up and after shower and breakfast, I go to rehab in the early morning – my husband is still driving me, because I am nervous to be on the highway with my upper body hurting from steering and with the seat belt not in the right place - I wear it under my left arm, because it hurts my chest;
• I come home and I snack – those exercises take away all my breakfast;
• Sometimes, I take a light nap or I catch up on email or the news;
• Then, I either read, or do some sitting down work/ crafts (mostly something I can do with my right hand) or I do house chores; I can't do strenuous ones (like vacuuming and cooking pots of food, or taking the trash out), but I put (small) dishes away, I dust, I put away clothes that have been washed, or clean up the cat's corner, etc;
• In the afternoon, after lunch, I either walk on my treadmill, or walk around the neighborhood, or lately, I have been going to a store and walking around there with my mom and my husband; my mom has gone back home now, so it will be harder to find excuses to go to the store often in the afternoon;
• Then, it's dinner time, and watching some tv;
• I try to stretch and do breathing and arm strengthening exercises all throughout the day; I am weak everywhere, but my arms feel it the most.

I have not been able to cook much yet. I made some hashbrowns in the oven the other day, and I reheat a lot of stuff, but I cannot peel a potato, or lift a pot of water of more than 1 qt from the sink.

I drove just around the neighborhood pretty much today, for the first time, and I was out of breath by the time I got to WalMart which is like 3 minutes away from my house. The steering wheel feels like it has no power steering at all, and it hurts my chest with every move. Plus, the “adjustment” I made to my seat belt does not hurt less, it just hurts in a different place – my left arm, instead, which is numb to begin with. I am definitely in no shape to start driving to work, which is at least 30 minutes away with no traffic, one way, all highway driving. I am not venturing on the highway yet.

Other than my weekly INR checking appointments, I have not had any other appointments lately. I am also blessed and every so grateful that I have not landed in ER or any other “unexpected” appointment yet.

The INR is a slippery, tricky beast, though, in itself. My target for now is 2-3. I have been fine … till last week when I decided to introduce leafy greens and broccoli to my diet, and boom! It tanked at 1.8. So, now, they increased a dose a little, only one day a week. I have no idea how it all works for them to decide which days to have 2 mg of Coumadin on and which days to have 1.5 mg, but this is what they do... They alternate the dose and spread the higher ones out through the week. It's OK for now to have the INR all over the place, because I am still learning what to eat, what affects it and how to be consistent about eating it, so I can balance the INR. Until then, weekly checks is what's needed.

I have gotten a phone call from my disability insurance to interview me and check whether “I am still sick”, basically. As much improvement as I have seen since leaving the hospital, I still cannot tell you that I have the stamina, and the strength in my body to resume work yet.

I am tired most of the time, even with a slightly easy schedule (above). I cannot muster more than 2 hours tops out of this house, and after that I must sleep and lay down for the rest of the day. I don't go out of breath from showering anymore, or washing my hair, but I still am completely done for the day after rehab in the morning (an hour or so) and a similar workout in the evening. And I don't trust myself to drive yet – which is a big part of my working life.

Another big part of my work life is typing – and with my numb and painful left hand, this is a challenge. I correct my misspellings all the time, because my typing is poor with my left hand.

My left arm is completely numb and very painful. All. The. Time. I can carry my purse, which is about 3 lbs, but I would not be able to even lift my work bag, which has my laptop in it, and my entire contents of my purse, not just the “abbreviated” ones I have now. I am thinking because of my upper body strength being so weak still, my back still hurting, my ribs, too, and because I am not gaining weight at all, I will have to use a dolly to carry my work bag and my lunch bag, when I do go back to work, for a long, long time.

I know you are wondering what can be so heavy to lift in a 2 qt pot and a 15 lbs (or maybe more?!) computer bag?! But I weigh 95 lbs right now. 15 lbs is more than 10% of my body weight, so to me, with no muscle mass to speak of, and just bones, and with the arms depending on the still cracked and healing sternum for support, this is a huge deal.

My incision is almost all healed, except for two spots which are still scabby. I still have a huge scab in the bend of my left knee, where they harvested the vein from. The left leg is numb but not as painful as my left arm.

I am getting there, albeit slowly. I am still paranoid about catching the flu or pink eye or something from the huge children population of my state, so I keep my visits to public places limited. I do have people visiting me, though, and I eat out maybe once a week – although I choose my restaurant carefully (cleaner, less kids, perhaps?!).

I am still uncomfortable sleeping – I don't see this changing any time soon. I am still learning a lot about Coumadin and my new life with it.

My blood pressure has been very low lately! Even with exercise, the last two times I went to rehab, it's been around the 108/35 range. Even after 40 minute 2.8 miles/ hour walk (I have small feet and short legs, so this is like running to me!), the blood pressure sits stubbornly at 110/45 or something crazy like this. I asked the rehab nurse and my cardiology nurse whether this is a problem, maybe my beta-blocker dose needs to be lowered, now that I have a “different” heart, but they insisted that if I am not lightheaded, then it's OK. So, I am keeping the 100 mg dose of atenolol that I have taken for 15+ years now.

I also asked about why being so tired all the time and why not assimilating anything I eat to gain some weight – they said all this is normal post-surgery fatigue, it will go away with time and patience and they said all that I am eating now goes to healing my body, and not to increasing my weight.

I am back on my vegan diet, because the animal protein I was trying to eat to increase my hemoglobin and address my anemia has made me sick (hives and GI issues). I am sticking just with fish (tuna and salmon mainly) and vegan meals. I do eat and the taste for food is mostly back, but for some reason assimilation of all I eat is the problem.

And that's what's new in the heart surgery recovery corner. Spring is slowly coming and I hope to move most of my exercise outdoors, whether I'll prune my roses or walk in the neighborhood to peek at neighbor's yard improvements. My sister and older nephew are coming to stay with us for a week, and I hope to take him to parks, to the aquarium, to a mall (not all of them in the same day, mind you!), so that will give me a reason to walk, too. One day at a time and one foot in front of the other is all I know, right now.

The short disability insurance person asked me how long do I think I will need before being completely ready for work – it's really just like asking someone how long do you think you're going to live. There is no telling. Days are sometimes good and some are really bad. Some days, I wake up in the middle of the night grabbing for a Tylenol, but wishing it was a Percocet, and some nights I can grind my teeth and end up just sleeping through the pain. I wish I knew what my body decides to do every minute, but it's like a crystal ball.