Daniel's Guestbook

Daniel: best wishes to you! I wanted to share my story with you in case it helps. I'm 62, I live in Indianapolis, IN, and Friday marked 12 weeks since I had my full sternotomy to repair my mitral valve (surgery was 9/25). I'm doing great, and so will you. I'm sitting here on Sunday evening, enjoying a nice Australian Shiraz, having spent the day running errands, doing laundry, and playing with my 2-year-old grandson who lives with us. At bedtime, I wrestled his wiggly "little" 33-pound body into PJs and then carried him into his room and put him in his crib. In other words, normal stuff! Candidly, it's only been the last few days that I've been able to do all that, because 12-weeks is the "magical" deadline for babying your healing sternum in terms of lifting and activities. And really, two weeks ago, I tried some of that and I wasn't ready for it; so it's really important (and was terribly difficult for me!) to be patient and listen to your body during recovery. Sounds like we have/had similar diagnoses. After years of monitoring some minor regurgitation in my mitral valve, my cardiologist heard a more pronounced murmur late last year, and a TEE in January revealed some of the chords had ruptured and I had more severe regurgitation -- but I was totally asymptomatic. Would never have known about the valve issue without the TEE. Pre-Covid, I went to the gym 3-4 times a week, did hour-long cycle/spin classes, full exertion, no problem. But it was only a matter of time, my docs told me, before that would change, my heart would get damaged, and I'd need either a repair or replacement. My surgeon thought a repair was totally viable and recommended doing it when I was at my healthiest. So I had surgery Sept. 25: a full sternotomy; he repaired all the broken chordae and reinforced others, plus did an annuloplasty. My surgeon described it as a total success. My stay in the hospital was pretty uneventful -- one night when I went into afib with my heartrate in the low 150s, but that was quickly remedied with meds/IV. I was up walking pretty fast; pain levels were really manageable; and I was out in 5 days. Recovery at home went really well and I didn't have any complications; just the "usual" issues: got tired easily, got lightheaded when I stood up from the meds. Starting one week after surgery, the only thing I took for pain was extra strength Tylenol (OK, after 4 weeks, I started supplementing a little bourbon in the evenings as well!). I started cardiac rehab 5 weeks after surgery -- went 3x a week for 5 weeks and "graduated" when I was able to do 30 minutes on the spin bike and elliptical. There have been a few normal bumps in the road -- some discomfort from time to time, especially when I overdid it. My blood pressure is a bit higher sometimes than it was, but my doctor says it's within normal range. The one thing I've heard dozens of times, because it's true, is that everyone's experience is different. I know my recovery was different than what others have gone through -- I had a much better go of it than a lot of folks, and I'm grateful for that. So I guess that's the reason I wanted to take the liberty to share a lot about my experience -- just to let you know that my journey went really well. Oh, and one other thing about the anxiety leading up to the procedure: I know a thing or two about that, because my surgery was postponed three times: the first time (Aug. 8) it was canceled 30 minutes before I left the house to drive to the hospital at 5:30 am, because my surgeon had to do an emergency surgery the night before; the second because someone in my house showed Covid symptoms the night before my rescheduled date (8/23); and the third time (9/23) because my surgeon had to do another emergency surgery. I pray you don't experience anything like that. But this is what kept me calm through all of that: I had confidence in my surgeon and the hospital team; I had confidence in myself (I was otherwise healthy); and I knew this procedure (full sternotomy) was the right decision for me, because I felt like it created the best situation for a great outcome (look, the so-called minimally-invasive approach still requires lots of cutting to get to your heart, and from my perspective, the docs have a lot less experience with that approach). I hope this is helpful in some way. Let me know if there's anything else I can do. Happy to answer questions, or even jump on a call with you in the next few days if you just want to ask questions or hear more about this first hand. Ron Gifford (I have a profile on here with a couple pictures post-op)