Back home and so happy to be ALIVE

My nurse, Summer, rips the tape off the last of my three IVs. Hurts like hell, but I'm so ready. She pulls out the IV and then puts more tape on it. She gives me my last hospital pain med, a potent combo of acetaminophen and ibuprophen. I get dressed in the mint-green pinstripe granny-pj top that buttons down the front and a soft black knit skirt. My 6-inch vertical incision is clearly visible out of the top of my shirt. Marlo actually says, "You're wearing that??" One look and he shuts up. Right now I only wanted to feel the sun and be outside and on the road home. Summer the Nurse helps me in the wheelchair and away we go. Wheeling through the hopsital after surviving open-heart surgery, I feel incredibly happy to be on "this side". The life side. As I'm wheeled passed my fellow ICUers and I'm so happy that I'm on this side, not that side. I see families in waiting rooms, awaiting word on their loved ones. I feel the tears well up thinking about Marlo in there, just five days ago, waiting for news. I think of my family and friends, anxiously waiting in Michigan, Canada, Colorado and other places. I'm so happy that WE, the Derksen and Allor families, are all on this side. My surgery is over. I have survived. I'm going home.

Home at last. My mother-in-law, Anne, is staying with us for another week or so. She greets me with a warm smile and asks if I need anything. I sit on the couch, feeling tired, sore and a bit nauseated. I get up, walk to my bedroom and for the first time in five days, I see myself.

I haven't looked in the mirror for five days. Seriously, five days of not seeing myself. I never thought about it before, but that's kinda weird. We see ourselves every day, many times. Head to toe, here is what I look like right now.

My eyes look sunken into my face a bit and I have very dark circles under them. My brown hair looks very witch-like, dry, frizzy and sort of wild looking. I'm already thinking about how I want to get it cut and colored. I have a scab and bruise on my neck where one of the IV catheters was placed. About one inch below my collar bone is the top of my incision. It is exposed, thin and red in places. There are no visible stitches. The inscision is covered with a derma-bond type substance that will eventually go away. What I can't see, but know are there are stitches, under the skin that will dissolve in a week or so. My sternum is held together with stainless steel wires. Those wires will stay in my body forever. My incision runs between my breasts and ends right around bottom center or my diaphram. About two inches under the incision, there is an odd little scabby hole from where a drainage tube protruded from my chest. Reminds me of how a newborn's belly button looks. One day the scab will pop off and I'll have my second little belly button. I have a few red scabs where pace-maker wires came through my skin. My left forearm is extremely bruised where an IV was placed. My right arm has a smaller bruise from another IV. My left groin area has another incision. This one is ugly, thick, about 3 inches long, and covered in derma-bond. This is from where my artery was pulled out to connect me to the heart/lung machine. My right groin had a gigantic bruise from the catheterization that took place two weeks ago.

Ok, the above description was probably TMI, but I feel like sharing! I'm just so happy to be here. And I want to look back on this in the future. Maybe someday down the line, I'll be angry at the kids for doing something stupid or maybe I'll complain about something random or feel angry at my husband. I can read this to kick my ass back into living, not complaining.