John's Profile

I'm not really fired up about sharing this but Ive determined it's time to tell the people I care about most what is going on out here in the desert. When I was 18 I had a Hodgkins tumor above my heart. As a result I had to have heavy radiation treatments to reduce the tumor to a manageable size, so that it could be treated with chemo. The irradiation of my chest has lead to calcification of the aortic and mitral valves in my heart and thus regurgitation. From the regurgitation, I now have an enlarged heart. My cardiologist and my surgeon are now of the opinion it's time to get the issue addressed. Isn't this fun? Sooooo.... In the next month or so I'm going to be going in for surgery at Scottsdale Health and will have two valves replaced, Aortic and Mitral. Doc says the radiation I had is likely to have dried up my pericardial sac, so he is expecting a longer than usual surgery. But he doesn't seem overly concerned. Of course I suppose that's required in his trade. Having fought through problems with my heart for the last few years, part of me is excited to have this done and part is pretty much scared out of my mind. I deeply trust my cardiologist and he is convinced that my surgeon is the best available out here, so I feel pretty good for now. All this may be a shock to some of you, but I hope you will understand it's not really a fun discussion to have over and over. Just know that if you are reading this then you mean a lot to me and I appreciate all of your thoughts. Feel free to check in here, I plan on trying to keep this fairly current if only for an outlet. Thank you again to all of you checking in. w/L- J