|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
I was prepped and wheeled into an operating suite. The surgeon, perfusionist, and entire medical team were in position, ready to perform a CABG on me; Coronary Artery Bypass Graft. Mine ended up being a quadruple.
They switched me over to a heart-lung machine, using potassium in the process, stopping my heart from beating. My life was literally kept alive by a machine.
The surgeon sawed my sternum open and exposed my heart.
I’ve watched enough YouTube videos of open-heart surgeries to get a reasonable visual of what my surgery was probably like. Let’s say I’m glad I was out when they did mine!
The first open-heart surgery was in the early 1960s. It didn’t go well. Since then, surgeons have perfected the process such that the mortality rate during surgery is less than 3 percent. In otherwords, I had a 97% probability of not dying on the operating table. (That’s somewhat comforting.) Surgeons in our city alone perform hundreds if not thousands, of open-heart surgeries annually. They’re fairly routine. My surgeon was a “rock star”; the best!
Stats aside, there is an entirely other side to having major surgery: emotions. Fear, fragility, mortality, and utter dependence on others assigned to your medical case. Nurses, doctors, phlebotomists, and surgical residents, each poking and prodding you. Catheters, central lines, and who knows what else are stuck in your body as you recover.
The first few days of recovery, I was in the CTICU, Cardio-thoracic Intensive Care Unit. The twist to my experience is that, as an architect, I designed the CTICU I was a patient in. Later, I was moved to a private room on the medical/surgery floor. Sandy was ever faithful to sit with me daily. I know it exhausted her, but her loving loyalty was a God-send of grace to me.
It’s been ten years since that surgery. By the grace of God, I am still here. Those clogged arteries, especially my right coronary artery (RCA), have been rerouted through grafts pulled from my left leg. My RCA is unusually small; only 2 mm in diameter. Small enough they cannot put a stent in it; thus, I’m on blood thinners for life, to mitigate the risk of a stroke.
As I’ve repeated to myself and others, “When you are in your 50s and have open heart surgery, whether you love Jesus or not, it rocks your world. My entire purpose for living was in question. Why am I here? What does God have for me next?”
There’s been a ton of experiences in this past decade that had I not had the surgery and passed away, I would have obviously missed: celebrating another ten years married to Sandy. Walking our daughter Karissa down the aisle. Celebrating our son Justin’s wedding. Grandchildren (three so far with twins on their way!), graduating (aka retiring) after 43 years at the same design firm, writing a book (Mentoring Warriors), starting a non-profit (Mentoring Warriors), and seeing hundreds be equipped to mentor and young men prepared for life, all from a Christ-centered perspective.
Yes, cardio-exercise has become a lifestyle. 200 minutes a week. That’s somewhere around 1700 hours of workouts in a decade. This summer in Ontario, I biked 200 miles, and never walked my bike up a hill!, hiked about 50, and kayaked almost 15 miles.
Beyond such and more, the greater impact another decade, so far, has had is an increasingly deeper intimacy with Jesus. Practicing the presence of God in daily life and having an impact on those around me. There’s an article that captures what I’m referring to; Nanosecond Jesus – Mentoring Warriors
My life verse is Galatians 2:20
I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Not that I am perfect at it, but yielding to Christ is far better than trying harder to be a Christian.
If the Lord gives me one more day, even one more nanosecond, my desire is that He be known and glorified.
Here’s to more heartbeats for Him!
Warrior On!
David Riffel is the Founder and Executive Director of www.Mentoring-Warriors.com. Having gone through his warrior years (18-30) essentially without a mentor, God has placed in him a heart for warriors, to come alongside them in various ways as they figure out life. David’s newly released book, Mentoring Warriors: Coming Alongside Young Men 18-30, outlines principles for mentoring and gives advice for warriors in six key areas of life: self-management, life skills, education/career, relationships, faith, and identity.
