{"id":1975,"date":"2024-01-31T17:33:59","date_gmt":"2024-01-31T23:33:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/?p=1975"},"modified":"2024-02-15T14:18:50","modified_gmt":"2024-02-15T20:18:50","slug":"day-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/2024\/01\/31\/day-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Day One"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

It\u2019s January 31, 2024, the first full day after the cardiac surgery. I’m still in the Cardiac ICU.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"
Hooked up to a couple of things <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Today\u2019s goal is to be monitoring me and disconnecting most of the leads and tubes. Once I have a met a minimum mobility goal of walking to the elevator, about 30-40 feet, a majority of wires and tubes will be removed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’ll qualify for the move down from the 5th floor to the 4th floor, the dedicated cardiac recovery unit where I\u2019ll stay until discharge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As I\u2019m doing this blog entry on the evening of Friday February 12nd I\u2019ll likely have forgotten some of the details. It\u2019s been quite a journey this time. More painful and challenging in many ways than everything that has come my way so far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thanks to all our family friends, and church friends for their ongoing support and prayers. We feel the love and God is still good, still on the throne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\n\n\n\n\n

The short update at this point is that from a cardiac perspective my heart surgery was quite successful and my recovery is progressing on track! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cardiac Event Timeline<\/strong><\/td>Days post-op<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
13<\/strong><\/td>Days since surgery<\/strong><\/td><\/strong>
<\/td><\/tr>
Date<\/strong><\/td>Event<\/strong><\/td>Days<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-15<\/td>Cardiac pre-op meeting in person<\/td>-15<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-22<\/td>Dr. Fagan phone consult with OR date (Jan 25th)<\/td>-8<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-25<\/td>Dr. Fagan call to cancel surgery (#1) but still check in<\/td>-5<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-27<\/td>Fords visit at the Asper Center<\/td>-3<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-28<\/td>Des & Eric visit at Asper Center<\/td>-2<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-29<\/td>Dr. J Hong  cancel surgery (#2)<\/td>-1<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-30<\/strong><\/td>Dr. Michael Raabe surgery<\/strong><\/td>0<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-30<\/td>Fords Visit on day of surgery <\/td>0<\/td><\/tr>
2024-01-31<\/td>ICU – Des visits<\/td>1<\/td><\/tr>
2024-02-01<\/td>Moved to Cardiac Ward from Cardiac ICU<\/td>2<\/td><\/tr>
2024-02-01<\/td>Eric visits, Mandy & Boys Facetime<\/td>2<\/td><\/tr>
2024-02-01<\/td>Blood Products – ICU<\/td>2<\/td><\/tr>
2024-02-02<\/td>Blood Products – Ward<\/td>3<\/td><\/tr>
2024-02-02<\/td>David, Merrill, Scott & Boys visit<\/td>3<\/td><\/tr>
2024-02-04<\/td>Discharged home at about 5pm<\/td>5<\/td><\/tr>
2024-03-20<\/td>Cardiac Clinic w\/ Dr. Raabe for a follow-up<\/td>50<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
It goes without saying that Shirley visited daily.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Getting to Day 2 and the Cardiac recovery unit.<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

When you leave the Operating Room you are connected to a lot of stuff, most of which is removed before you get clearance for the move. In no particular order a chest tube needs to be pulled out. This is like a 3\/8\u201d clear plastic tube you could buy at Home Depot. It\u2019s draining blood and gunk from inside my chest into a plastic box at bedside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A similar tube with a much difference function, a Foley Catheter<\/a>, is also removed. Don\u2019t worry guys it\u2019s not bad and going in, you\u2019re unconscious in the OR. \ud83d\ude1c<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At some time during the surgery two wires are attached to my heart and come out of the left side my chest and are connected to an external pacemaker. It’s programmed to kick in if my heart rate gets too low. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Serious stuff happens here in the OR as they harvest veins from my left leg between the knee and ankle to form the cardiac bypass graft material. I\u2018m unconscious for about 5 hours. 100-120 minutes of that time my heart is stopped and I\u2019m on the bypass machine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I wake up in the ICU recovery room and Shirley is there \ud83d\ude0d As I regain consciousness, the breathing tube is removed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s January 31, 2024, the first full day after the cardiac surgery. I’m still in the Cardiac ICU. Today\u2019s goal is to be monitoring me and disconnecting most of the leads and tubes. Once I have a met a minimum mobility goal of walking to the elevator, about 30-40 feet, a majority of wires and … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Day One”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1975","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1975"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1975\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2010,"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1975\/revisions\/2010"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigdadoo.com\/journey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}