Parties and Hospital Beds

A year ago, I was being discharged from the hospital.

A year ago, the red scars down the front of my chest were fresh, covered in bandages that I shouldn’t get wet. I could not sleep for more than 2 hours straight, and often sat up painfully in plastic chairs tired and hot, hungry but too nauseous to eat.

A year ago, I couldn’t walk for more than five minutes at a time, and I stumbled with my hands crossed over my chest, a baby pillow wrapped in my arms. Sitting in cars produced cricks in necks, and self-sponge bathing was awkward. Slugs moved faster, and with more dignity.

A year ago, a friend who had promised she would come to the coast and visit me during the whole thing, didn’t. And a girl I liked, and devoted much of my earnest attention to her trials in the past, didn’t even send me a text. Many people would show up to a party, but too few take the time to visit hospital beds. Only one of the two really matters. Only one of the two will I really remember.

A year ago, I was miserable. A dear friend of mine privately commented that, when I lost my job before surgery, they were concerned I might actually commit suicide over the whole thing. My father continually suggested that after surgery life would turn around for me, I’d feel so much better with that emotional baggage of “needing surgery” over and done with. They were both wrong. My lowest point was a year ago, just after the surgery, and just after the hospital. My heart, and its dysfunction, had never played a role in my mind until after the surgery. Never. Not once did I ever feel limited, or cautious, because of some supposed difficulty with the ticker. And now, since a year ago, I’ve worried about it more with its “fixed” valve than I ever have before. I wish they had never needed to fix it.

“Do you ever just throw a pity party for yourself?”

I smiled when I was given the question. Yes. Yes I do.

A year later, I’m still going. My family – today and last year - never stopped being there for me, and has always been the very definition of what love should be. I am headed to school in the fall, and am back to work. I’m even re-finding my old ambitions and passions – to fight for what’s right, to not give a shit about what’s not important, and to laugh honestly when we confuse the two.

But yes, friend. Sometimes I still walk with an emotional pillow crossed between my arms, hugged against my heart.

The new scars begin to dull, but they still feel foreign. Not at all like my old scars, which had been a part of me. Which I had privately liked.

- Z