Richard and Bob,
I think Richard's "totally up to you" comment warrants some additional commentary. I agree with Richard in the sense that, no matter how ingrained a viewpoint we may hold, it is not based on the circumstances of our lives, but rather our beliefs about how we "need" to or are "supposed" to react to those circumstances. These beliefs are what we have accepted from childhood through the current da,y based on societal, familial, religious and other values and beliefs we have adopted, usually without consciously thinking about it. While these beliefs may serve us well in adapting to society, they also may cause us to react in a manner that we are "supposed to," depressed, for example, when something traumatic occurs in our lives. In fact, however, we are not required to feel any particular way based solely on the occurrence of an event. If it were otherwise, then everybody would react in the identical way under identical circumstances, instead of the myriad ways that people actually react to the same or similar events.
What really is happening is that we ignore the present moment in favor of projecting what we believe/fear will be our lives in a future that doesn't exist except in our imaginations. Here's an example. About nine years ago, I suffered a lower back injury lifting weights that left me with a severe case of sciatica for nearly a month. The pain was so excruciating that I could barely get to the bathroom. I also had no idea when or if the pain would subside. If someone had told me the day before my injury, that I was going to be in excruciating pain for the next month, I probably would have been very upset and wondered how I would survive such hell. As it turned out, though, that month was one of the happiest periods in my life, during which I was free from the concerns of work, watched great movies on TV (to was 30 days to Oscar on TCM) and read the recently published collected works of a psychotherapist teacher of mine with whom I trained while an undergraduate during the halcyon days of the early 70's. My reality turned out nothing like what I likely would have imagined it. This is because our fantasies of what the future will mean for us always lack the multidimensional elements that we can't imagine in the grip of our fears, and because we fail to recognize those fears for what they actually are; beliefs about an imagined reality that doesn't exist other than in our own minds.
Ultimately, we all have the power to examine our underlying beliefs about why we think we need to feel a particular way about a particular event, whether or not we actually exercise that power. In fact, once we recognize that we have the ability to examine and possibly discard such beliefs if they are not working for us, we also gain the awareness that "totally up to you" really means that we are free, and not condemned to suffer our "fate" in someway that we may believe is necessary but actually is conditioned upon our own beliefs.
Sorry about the dissertation, folks, but thinking about this stuff is how I actually enjoy occuping my time.
Ira
------------------------------
Ira Reid
Hoboken NJ
------------------------------
Original Message:
Sent: 01-14-2020 10:06
From: Robert Levin
Subject: "CARDIAC BLUES"
Richard-
You make a valuable point about life bringing us ups-and-downs before our surgeries, which we tended to more easily get over as things that would pass; being brushed by mortality makes it more difficult though. I also couldn't agree more that we are all different and will have different experiences to similar traumas but I think you are being a bit harsh to say it is "totally up to" each of us how we respond. By the time some people get hit with heart surgery, the circumstances of their lives may have left them ill-equipped to get over the experience, and to suggest they have this capacity and not recognizing these difficulties may lead them to blame themselves and compound their problems.
Bob Levin
Berkeley, CA
Sent from Mail for Windows 10
Original Message------
Hello all,
I had my CABG X4 on March 24, 2015. I had a pacemaker installed on 15 August 2017. My chest scar became keloid and the itching and raw wound feeling made it almost unbearable. Had the scar revision surgery 21 November 2017. 90% success of keloid removal after surgery. A small amount of keloid returned mid sternum. Here it is January of 2020 and I still have some scar tenderness. My sternum still has a few spots that are sensitive to small amounts of pressure. I still get depressed at times. Carrie, Michelle, and all you other folks don't worry about the aches and pains that you are having. Some folks completely heal without issues, while some of us will have major issues.
We are all different, I have arthritis as well, some folks have asthma or other issues. All these things also affect how your healing will progress. I have been treated for PTSD due to my military service many years before my heart issues, but I had to deal with my post-op depression separately.
As an accredited visitor I have met with folks that are dealing with issues far greater than mine and they were some of the happiest people I have ever met. Yet other folks with something a simple as a Stint are feeling like their world has come to an end.
The key is, how you deal with this new life is totally up to you.
My wife and I have sold our home and are now traveling full time in an RV all over the country. I see my doctor on the fly, schedule appointments around the trips and get my meds on the road. (Thanks Rite-aid & CVS) I have portable O2 for high altitudes and we just keep on seeing and meeting all over the country.
I rest when I need to and have just decided to go explore. I am not able to do some things I like so I do other things instead. I want you all to know you can have pain and soreness and still have fun. You are limited in some directions, but not all. Ups and downs were in your life before your heart events, but we took them for granted and blew them off. but with being in bed longer and moving slower we have more time to dwell on them now. It does get better in you want it too. ����. Wow, I did not mean to give a sermon. I just felt the need to say some things. This is also part of how I deal with my depression. I sometimes need to talk it out. Thank you for allowing me to vent, and Happy New Year to all.
Richard Short
Chapter 395