{"id":32579,"date":"2020-12-21T08:20:03","date_gmt":"2020-12-21T13:20:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/?p=32579"},"modified":"2021-01-05T11:20:08","modified_gmt":"2021-01-05T16:20:08","slug":"15-anniversary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/2020\/12\/21\/15-anniversary\/","title":{"rendered":"Woo-Whoo!!! My 15th Heart Valve Surgery Anniversary!!!"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s difficult to imagine that 15 years ago today… I was rolled into an operating room to replace my defective bicuspid aortic valve<\/a> during open heart surgery.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Adam<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Leading up to the surgery…<\/p>\n

Many people told me I would be fine.<\/p>\n

Many people told me I would “bounce back” after surgery.<\/p>\n

Many people told me their thoughts and prayers were with me.<\/p>\n

When I expressed my fears, anxiety and concerns about the surgery, a few people told me the reality of my situation… That aortic stenosis is a very dangerous disease<\/a> that would take my life.<\/p>\n

What no one told me, however, was that 15 years after surgery…<\/p>\n

I would consider myself one of the luckiest people alive.<\/p>\n

“Why would Adam say that?” you might be wondering.<\/p>\n

There are so many reasons, I don’t know where to start.<\/p>\n

One of the BIG (and I mean BIG) reasons is the extra-ordinary people within the HeartValveSurgery.com community.\u00a0If you’re reading this right now… That means you!!!<\/p>\n

I often tell people that HeartValveSurgery.com is one of the greatest flukes and most wonderful blessings of my life.<\/p>\n

It’s true.<\/p>\n

When I started this blog, I never thought anybody would care. But, soon enough, to my surprise…<\/p>\n

People, amazing people from all over the world, started to care.<\/p>\n

Like me, they needed help. Like me, they wanted to be educated. Like me, they wanted to be listened to. And, like me, they wanted their voices to be heard.<\/p>\n

The rest is darn good history.<\/p>\n

If there is one thing I would like to share with you… <\/p>\n

It is that I am incredibly thankful and humbled that you gave me a chance to be of service during this past 15 years. <\/p>\n

It is a very special privilege to know you and support you in your time of need. It is an honor that I get to meet so many caring people – patients, family members, friends, doctors, physician assistants, nurses, medical teams, medical companies, scientists, researchers, etc. – who have united with a common cause.<\/p>\n

It is a gift that I am able to channel our collective voices – yours and mine –\u00a0to help others.<\/p>\n

Lastly… If, by chance, you were just diagnosed with heart valve disease. Or, if you are now preparing for your surgery.\u00a0 If you are kinda like me 15 years ago. I want you to know that I am here for you. And, this community is here for you. Let us know how we can help!<\/p>\n

Keep on tickin!
\nAdam<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adams-updates"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32579"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32579\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32814,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32579\/revisions\/32814"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heart-valve-surgery.com\/heart-surgery-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}