This week was serious heart week for me – blood work, EKG, heart tests, medication review, the works. It all turned out very well. My heart is good, my blood numbers are excellent, my cholesterol is just where it ought to be, my all-important A1C is where it ought to be.

All good, said Dr. Karaban, my cardiologist, who is easy going but thorough. My Open Heart Surgery was five years ago, it came after a long flirtation with all holistic medicine that nearly cost me my life.

But I learned a lot from it. I learned not to be rigid, there are great things about holistic medicine, and great things about conventional medicine – like the ability to stop my heart and rebuild parts of it.

It was a life-saver for me, fortunately, I went to see my Nurse Practioner just as I was having a heart attack, or heart “event” as they call it. Three days after my surgery, I was back at work. I don’t often forget that just a few years, I would be a distant memory by now, and there would be no Lab puppy named Zinnia in the works.

Maria, I imagine, would be holed up in a stucco studio in New Mexico, running around with a tall and handsome man I’ve always called “He Who Walks With Wolves.” This is my fantasy about who Maria might run off with, given the chance. I’m thinking this fantasy probably won’t happen now, my paranoia grows week in age.

My open heart surgery awakened me. I take good care of myself now, I get tested when I should be tested. Switching to an all-female medical team for my general health, for my diabetes, for my heart was good decision for me. (You don’t to tell me about your wonderful male doctors, I know there are very good men in medicine, it’s just that I really need to have women doctors to feel comfortable.

I was reminded of this when I saw my cardiologist, Dr. Nicoletta Daraban, of the Saratoga Hospital Medical Group. She and everyone in her office are incredibly nice, helpful and efficient. We had our bi-annual talk about life, children, the city versus the country, and also, of course, about my heart.

Dr. Daraban alone affirms my decision to find women doctors. It is just comfortable, I can ask her anything, and she will answer me truthfully and clearly. I don’t know what she reads, but she has never mentioned “data” to me.

How are you?, I asked when I saw her.

“I’m good,” she said. “How are you?” She’s one of those doctors who wants to know more than test results, she wants to get a sense of me. She glanced at the EKG and then put it aside. The nurse seemed bored by it also.

“I am great,” I said, “I’m happy, I feel good, I love my life.” This startled her, she said she doesn’t hear that all the time. “You must be healthy, then,” she said. We talked a bit about perspective and attitude and it’s  effect on my health and my heart.

I talked about my work with the refugees and the Mansion residents, and I said I believe this has had an important impact on my health. I  have no interest in down-sizing my life.

I said I thought old talk was a disease. I said I felt fatigue at times in the early afternoon, I had wondered if it was my heart. It isn’t your heart, she said, switch the timing of your medications a bit and see what happens. I wouldn’t have thought of that.

We went over my medications. I had very few questions for her, I worry about my  Brave Heart sometimes, but I am aware of what it feels like when it’s sick, and what it feels like when it isn’t.

It isn’t sick, but it’s good to have affirmed by a professional. I remember being told I was having a heart attack and needed surgery, and I’d rather not hear that again.

I called Maria and said “the news is that you will have to put up with me for a few more years at least.” She sounded happy, and Maria doesn’t even know how to lie.

The important thing for me is that I am learning to take care of myself. To ask for help when I need it.  In body and mind, help helps.

I get tested when it is important. I keep my health in mind, but not the center of my existence. I monitor my meditations, take my pills. And I have a new motto, which I often have to repeat: don’t ask me about my health, ask me how I am living my life.

What I’ve learned is that it is important to take responsibility for myself, and not just pretend expensive herbs will save me alone. And the most important thing I’ve learned is that love and purpose and fulfillment are the best medicines in the world.

I also researched health plans closely and have a good one, given what that means in modern health care, they even pay for some expensive new medication few heart patients can get or afford.

Are you exercising much? she asked. “Not in gyms,” I said, “I walk fairly often and am active on my farm. I can’t do formal exercise, it makes me crazy.”

Great, Dr. Daraban said, “whatever you’re doing, keep doing it, you’re heart is is good. Why don’t you come back in six months?”

She was done with me for now, that was a good thing.

I thank my Brave Heart for not quitting on me, and for reminding me that I am responsible for my life.