Replies

Open heart surgery is no joke that’s for sure, the mental part was much harder on me than the physical part, there was a 3-week gap between when I agreed to the surgery and when I had the surgery, as much as you try, that’s all you think about.

Then in Cardiac ICU after the surgery, I was told I had entered stage 3 heart block and needed a pacemaker, mentally that was a hard thing for me to accept.

After I got home, the anxiety about whether your heart was going to hold up was a real thing.

That’s why I said Cardiac Rehab was the single best thing I did in recovery, the harder I worked the better I felt, and the anxiety went away because my heart was working great and held up.

You have two choices when it comes to heart valve replacement, you can choose a biologic valve, which in my case was a pig valve or a mechanical valve.

I chose the pig valve because with a mechanical valve you have to be on Warfarin every day for the rest of your life, with a pig valve I was on eloquis for 3 months, the pig valve lasts between 10-15 years and doesn’t require blood thinners for the rest of your life, and can be replaced with a procedure that goes thru the main artery in your groin, a one hour procedure with a one day stay in the hospital.