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Reading your comment, but I did not see if you were aware you had a aneurysm to begin with. I have been monitored now since 2020 for a Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm to check how fast it is growing. Last check it was at 3.9. I am due for another check in April. I know if they tell me its time for surgery, that I will be very anxious. It sounds like in your case you did not have time to think about it. In some ways that could be a good thing, but the best thing is that you were able to have it taken care of. You were blessed that you did not die from having a dissection of it. I hope you are doing well since the surgery. I as many others I am sure would like to know how you are now. Those of us who are still in watchful waiting do not know what to expect. God Bless You.
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Hi Suzie
I had no idea. I see this is as both a blessing and a curse. I had an aneurysm but I didn't know it. It was 6.5cm and far larger than anyone would have let continue. I was in a lot of pain and I knew something was wrong. But what? I was scared and knew that I was not going to survive.
With no warning I could have left this world almost instantly. The odds were already greatly stacked against me. And my leaving would have devastated the lives of many others. But I >did< know something was terribly wrong and that was extremely hard for me.
With warning I could have prepared for the eventuality - say, at 4cm started on medication, at 4.5cm began to plan my immediate and long term future, and 5cm or more I could have had some time to circle the wagons and alter my life. At every step I guess I could have had more lead time to make sense of my life and get things on track.
But my chest exploded and my aorta ripped from my heart to my legs. I had 5 minutes before surgery to decide what kind of valve I would get. I didn't even know at that point that I was going to have surgery!
For the surgery, there was no guarantee of success or recovery - that's how bad I was. And to make it worse I did go back into surgery a second time that night as my BP had dropped to 50. I didn't know any of this of course but it sent my family into a spiral that they have never truly recovered from. I think it was first 8 hours and then another 2 hours of surgery to fix things. That second one was the worst because my wife had to make a decision without me.
I wish that I had warning, and time, and a plan, and a doctor, and a lot of things.
By some miracle I survived. And the skills of a lot of people kind of helped 🙂
Suzie - thank you for asking. I am doing well - I still have the complete dissection - that couldn't be helped. And heart failure.
But after a year I am a little weaker than before and this is the new me (ta da!) - I just [ulld over for a while, got some new parts for the engine, and now I am back on the road.
Maybe instead I should talk about recovery? I came through it and with no time to prep I learned the hard way about a lot of things. I have covered this in another post - what to do after surgery so we can plan now for better and faster recovery later.
PM if you'd like. Happy to talk some more.