Since my surgery in July, I have noticed something strange. When I pull my car into a parking space or into the farm, I find myself seeing there for a minute or two – I used to just get out. I don’t know why I do that, I feel I need some space in between one place or another, I think, Maria has noticed me sitting in the car sometimes. I can’t explain it, I just sit there for a while.

Today I pulled into the Cardiac Rehab spot – there is plenty of parking for us, the hospital does not want us walking up a hill – and I sat there for a minute or two. Then something strange happened. I had a powerful experience, a flashback, I think. I felt a wave of terror and sadness – I felt precisely what I thought I would feel before the surgery but did not. It was almost as if I was back on that gurney heading into the operating room to have my heart stopped and my chest opened up.

It was an awful fear, a powerful one.

I have wondered for weeks why I felt no fear before the surgery and it seemed as if I were feeling it today, it was so powerful. It was almost a physical experience, it pushed me back into my seat, I sad there with Red for a few minutes. I’ve had a rough week in some ways this week, the Open House was a wonderful experience for Maria and I, but I was exhausted by Sunday night, and it set me back, I am just getting back on my feet.

I keep telling the nurses that I think the recovery ought to be over by now, they keep laughing and telling me it is just beginning. They did open up your heart, she says.  They have heard it before, seen it before.

I am dealing with the aftershocks of surgery and diabetes – my blood sugar runs amok sometimes, which is normal after open heart surgery. I am dealing with the fluid retention that also frequently occurs, my weight leaps up and down and needs to be watched, as weight gain can strain the healing heart. More medicine, and it is possible I will be dealing with it for the rest of my life, every person’s recovery is different.

I am grateful that I stuck with Cardiac Rehab, I have grown stronger and more confident in many areas – on the treadmill, the arm strengthening machine, the eliptical steppers. I am stronger than I have been in a long time, healthier. I am walking three or four miles a day, riding my stationary bike for long stretches several times a week. I am getting there, impatient, as always, to be there, puzzled that it takes so long. Perhaps one of the many gifts of surgery will be patience.

I was shaken by my flashback, I think it was something that needed to come out and come up, I suspect it was there the while time. I am learning that emotion is as tiring to my heart as exercise, perhaps this is the reason the Open House wore me out. Everyone told me I looked tired at the Spring Open House, they told me I looked great at this one, yet I was so much more exhausted Sunday and Monday than I was in June. That’s the thing about recovery, it has it’s own life, it’s own way of being.

In a way, I am glad I felt the terror of surgery, it was almost a relief. It only lasted for a few minutes, and when I mentioned it to one of my Cardiac Rehab pals, she smiled and nodded. “Me, too,” she said, “it comes up at odd times.” I feel things acutely, my heart is different, it is full of oxygen and blood and beating strong, I can hear it sometimes in the night.

Sitting in the lot, I felt a great sadness. I do not believe in struggle stories, but something in me told me to let this one come on. I did. Why has this happened to me? Could I have prevented it by taking better care of myself? How will I deal with all of the things I have to deal with in the next months and years? Will Maria tire of living with a man who takes a basket full of pills all day? Will my broken heart every really heal, can I ever put this behind me, or will it always be a scramble to keep up?

I sat in the car, crying, Red leaning over from the back seat, concerned. I am not sure he has ever seen me cry.

In my rehab, I watched the brave souls as they made their way from one machine to another, reached deep for breath and strength, and I noticed there was a common answer to the question most frequently asked in rehab: “How are you?”

The answer I kept hearing was “I’m hanging on.” I am grateful to be hanging on also, and then some. To be doing better than that.