Hi Jennifer,
When I was 67 years old, an active athlete and weight lifter for the past 55 years, I had what they described as a mild heart attack. It was so mild that it didn't even show up on an EKG and I was told that there was no visible heart damage. They told me that I would be going for an angiogram, that they probably would find a blockage in one or to coronary arteries, that they likely would insert a stent or two and that I'd likely be discharged from the hospital in four days.
The angiogram disclosed that I had major blockages in five coronary arteries, including the left anterior descending coronary artery known as the widow maker, that stents were not feasible, that I was being scheduled for emergency quintuple bypass surgery, but that I would be fine and discharged in a week. I reassured my wife and daughter and went off to surgery.
I began to awaken from the surgery two weeks later. I was in a semiconscious, hallucinatory, delusional state for another week after that. My wife told me that, while the surgery went perfectly well, the doctors decided to keep me intubated on the ventilator another day or so in order to reduce some swelling in my heart. During that extra time on the ventilator, I contracted bacterial pneumonia, sometimes known as hospital pneumonia, which turned out to have been caused by an atypical bacterium that required two different antibiotics to treat. The antibiotics wound up also killing my gut bacteria and I developed a c-diff superbug intestinal infection, requiring yet more antibiotics. I remained on the ventilator all this time.
When I finally regained my senses, a week after awakening, I was so weak that I could't feed myself or stand, let alone walk. I was sent to a rehab hospital for an additional three weeks, where I made remarkable daily progress. That progress continued when I finally arrived home, six weeks after surgery, and began a walking and outpatient rehab program. In another six weeks, I was back in the gym lifting weights again. I am now 70 years old, back at the gym (until covid) lifting, doing bodyweight workouts and cardio. I'm doing the same, now, either at home or un the public park, feeling like Jack Lalanne 2.0.
I'm here to tell you that complications, bad ones, happen, but we can and do survive and even thrive. Good luck to your mom and to you and your whole family, who I know are going through the same hell of uncertainty and unwelcome surprises that my wife and daughter experienced. I wish you all strength, renewed health, peace and love.
Ira
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Ira Reid
Hoboken NJ
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