Survival

I’ve umm-ed and err-ed about whether I should write this post for a while now, but in the end I’ve decided it’s something I need to get out. I am also linking up with I Am Typecast’s Do Something Yummy prompt of Survival.

A week ago today my Dad went to the hospital for an angiogram after having several heart tests. He was expecting to be told he needed a stent. He came home and broke the news he needed a tripe heart bypass. To many, and certainly to me, if news like this doesn’t come from somebody close, it doesn’t really affect you that much. You acknowledge it’s a big operation and that the reasons behind it are serious, but it doesn’t really hit you like the sledgehammer it did me, just how serious this is.

My Granddad died from heart problems in his early fifties, so we have always been aware as a family that the trait may pass down the genes. My Dad has always had regular tests and been a pretty active guy. That’s not to say that there wasn’t a niggling voice in mine, and probably all our heads, saying it might only be a matter of time. It appears now is that time. So we sit and wait for the letter to thunk like a brick through the letterbox announcing the date we are to count down to when Dad goes into surgery.

Now you can quote all the stats to me you want, how many people have this every year and how great the success rate is. At the end of the day it is my Dad who will have his chest opened up on an operating table and will come out with wires sticking out his like he is some sort of machine. And to say I am afraid is putting it mildly.

I came home after that Wednesday not in the greatest of forms, and did blub all over John like the silly mare I am. It does make me wonder at how inable I seem to be to handle any form of stress – I’m blaming the 28 week old Baby Boy (not even born and he’s taking the blame!) inside me and the hormones that come along with. To think of my ever-strong Dad unconscious and being worked on is quite hard for me to comprehend.

But anyway, regardless of all this, my Dad will be fine. Unlike many others for whom it has been too late and they didn’t even make it to diagnosis, their heart simply gave way without warning. My Dad has been very lucky, he has had one mild pain and from that found out how seriously his heart is diseased. He, and the family, will survive this.