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A New Sense of Living

Monday, February 08, 2016

By Katherine Buchanan

A little over two years ago I had my second heart surgery. I was a sophomore in college and terrified of the prospect of putting my life in someone else’s hands. While the support of my family and friends was immense and so meaningful, it could not put my fears of mortality and pain at bay.

The period of waiting and recovery was long, dramatic and difficult and defined by a rollercoaster of truly dynamic feelings. I remember walking around my college campus during the fall semester of my sophomore year feeling defined by limitations and drowning in the immense weight of my depression and anxiety.

Then, I felt utterly transformed in the spring semester when I returned from surgery not only healthy, but also hyper-aware of the gift of life and the joy and blessings that come with it. My sophomore year was defined by my intense reactions to open heart surgery, both positive and negative.

I think that my experience is not an outlier. I feel certain many with congenital heart disease go through a similar process of grief and rejoicing around the time of their surgery, and even in the months, weeks and years that go between treatments.

I sense that my new sense of living is also not alien to other CHDers’ experiences either. Two years post-surgery I have passed many milestones. As I’ve shared in previous blogs, I’ve hiked mountains, traveled the world and pushed myself to my healthy limits. I witness similar experiences by my zipper brothers and sisters, too. They run marathons, travel the world to perform life-giving surgeries and push their hearts to their healthy limits.

But the narrative I search for now and the experience I am living is a different one. It is defined by a state of normalcy where I no longer feel defined by my abilities or my disabilities. It is a place where I am not pushing my limits, but living in the everyday.

In the second semester of my senior year, as I walk around my college campus, I am in some ways witnessing my sophomore self. I see her pass me on the sidewalk as I recall the vivid memories I have across campus. I see her saddened by her diagnosis and then proud of a major physical feat, but I no longer feel that dramatic reaction she felt in the year surrounding her ability transformation.

I see her, but I feel grounded in another reality, a reality marked by the job search, class projects, fun times with friends and the desperate desire to make as many memories as possible between now and graduation. My experience has moved beyond just my heart and my identity now also encompasses so many other new things.

As I live in this new reality, I am discovering what this means for the CHD piece of my identity. I wonder how to live my life in this state of wellness, with so much distance from my surgery, without stuffing my CHD identity in the corner and only dragging it out when I feel stressed or anxious. I am seeking how I can honor this part of my identity and share my CHD story while experiencing this stage of my life.

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