How does Monday sound for your surgery?

I was a little sore and dragged out the day after the Heart

Catheterization. This would have been somewhere around the middle of

November.

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I can't remember the exact sequence of events but within a week my Cardiologist had called and made an appointment for me to hear the results of the test. The results: four blockages in the arteries around my heart. His recommendation was a bypass operation, as soon as possible.

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He would still have to present my case to the surgical department heads and establish what priority my situation was, in order to get an admission date.

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He phoned a few days later to tell me that they had accepted my case and would admit me at the first possible opening. This brings us to mid-December.

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On Friday, December 19th I attended a pre-admission clinic which would prepare me should an opening occur. It was an all day thing involving lots of blood tests, consultations with all of the departments that are involved with an open heart surgery and meeting the fellow who would actually be performing the surgery.

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What nice people! I don't mind admitting I was very uncomfortable and stressed at the thought of what I was about to undergo. But, everyone I met or consulted with was calm, reassuring and most of all compassionate.

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There was even a guy in the waiting room that had undergone the same operation. He was waiting for me between appointments and told me about his experience. He left me with his card so that I could call him if I had any questions before or after the surgery. That was the first time I had ever heard the term "Zipper Club".

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Back to my story, I was attending this pre-admission clinic to be ready for whenever an opening occurred. I figured it might be at least a month or more, based upon the way our health care system is portrayed on the news and in the papers.

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Well the reality is much different I can assure you. At about three o'clock that afternoon as I was waiting to speak to the anesthetist, the nurse who was coordinating my visit said to me,

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"How does Monday sound for your surgery?"

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The rest of the day went by in a blur. It was Friday, by Monday morning I would be starting down a path to an unknown destination.