Getting Heart-Healthy

It's still good! Get me a straw!

  You know how it goes when you're making a smoothie, and you decide to try some new things, and you don't follow a recipe, you're just tossing all kinds of stuff in a blender, and you hit "puree" but you forgot to put the lid on, so sticky, green-ish, clumpy goo splatters all over your kitchen, but the muck left in the bottom of the blender after you shut it off tastes pretty good in a not-what-I-expected sort-of way? So that's been the last 2 1/2 months. Some unexpected events but it's all OK (now that we got the sticky stuff off the ceiling).

Me and my brother circa 1975. Pretty cute, huh?

  I take you back to the day after my last blog post, February 29th. My brother Doug was admitted to the hospital with pneumonia. He'd been pretty sick for a while and his Urgent Care visits had resulted in little more than wasted time and medical bills. "Urgent Care. No sense of urgency, not super-caring, but it's Sunday afternoon and we're all you've got 'cuz nobody wants to camp out in the hospital emergency room." The hospital staff ran some tests and discovered that Doug had three blocked arteries and a blood clot in his heart. He also has type 2 diabetes which complicates things further. After his release from the hospital, Doug was told he would need bypass surgery, that his heart was 18% dead, that he would die within a year without surgery and that he may need a heart transplant. We waited two weeks for the appointment with the heart surgeon who told my brother that he wasn't certain that he would be able to take Doug off of the heart and lung machines after surgery and that he would be referring him to another heart surgeon in Tacoma (45 minutes away).

Because everyone deserves first-class health care...

 
  More waiting for appointments, first to a new cardiologist and then to the new surgeon. These guys were WAY MORE optimistic about Doug's condition. No need for a transplant, no one-year countdown to the grave. Back to the diagnosis for a five-way bypass and BOOM-Doug 2.0! My brother was finally admitted to surgery on April 27th-nearly TWO MONTHS after he first entered our local hospital. In that time, we moved Doug out of his apartment and into our spare room, putting most of his things in storage so we can care for him during recovery. I get to put Doug on a leash a few times a day for his walks, wrestle him into these stunning compression socks (like shoving a Barbie doll's legs into a drinking straw), administering a plethora of medications on schedule (except for the injections. Nope. Not doing that. That's all him) and preparing low-carb as well as heart-healthy meals. NO MORE BACON!!!!! For him. Not us. My tolerance for sacrifice only stretches so thin. I'm only human! 

Could be just Skittles and Tic-Tacs, but it can't make you feel any worse, right?

  Heart-healthy is WAY less fun than low-carb. Doug's doctors said that for the time being he needs to follow the diabetic diet (low carb) more than he needs to adhere to heart-healthy (low-fat, low-sodium, high-fiber. You know BLAND BLAND BLAND!). It's a good thing we're already on board with that! Easy-peasy-lemon-squeazy! Just a few extra tweaks like watching sodium content, switching to canola oil and giving up organ meats (WHAT? No more gizzards and brains?) TA-DA! Heart Healthy!
  You must be wondering why I haven't written about this until now. Listen, we all have our own way of dealing with challenges and crises. I tend to go inside my hard-candy shell deep into the unsweetened bitter chocolate center. I have to process the absolute worst of the "what-ifs" first. Once I have a plan for the outright darkest scenarios possible I'm able to then crack through the candy coated gloom and develop strategies for handling the impending crisis. It's really difficult to let other people see me go through this process. It's not a good color on me. 
  And yes, I did envision my brother not surviving the surgery. I mentally planned his celebration of life. I thought about the photos and music for his picture-video montage. I composed (in my head) his eulogy. It's really quite good. Touching, humorous, thoughtful. I should write it down and share it with him while he's around to appreciate it. Too soon? Yeah, you're right. I'll save it for his birthday. KIDDING!!!! I also outlined what I needed to do to care for him until I can nudge him back out of the nest when he's ready to fly. 

Tough love, kiddo!

  So, two months ago we threw a bunch of crap in a blender and left the lid off. SPLOOSH! And now we're eating even healthier and my little brother gets a fresh start with a refurbished heart. 

Comments, prayers, tips for a healthy heart and questions are always appreciated. Comment below or email me at sprout624@gmail.com