So, as I stated before, I had no information about the donor heart, no ideas to where it was coming from to provide some sort of timeline of when I might head in for surgery, no update on when the Intermountain surgeon from here would be flying out to see the heart...nothing. Just knew that there was in fact a heart, and on paper, it looked like a perfect match. I had everyone come up that could and was willing to keep my nerves at bay while I just waited for the unknown. There were so many raw emotions at that time. Anxiety because I didn't know what to expect or what was the next step, fear, regarding whether or not it was a match - because if it was, here we'd go and I'd be getting a heart transplant a WHOLE lot sooner than I had thought; but also fear that it would be a false alarm, and I would have gone through all of that anxiety and phases of adrenaline, only to be sent home. I am so blessed that I've never had that happen to me, but I do know of several others who it has happened to. Of course, the let down can be almost unbearable, especially depending on how sick you are, but it is important to remember that with this big of a surgery, they aren't going to cut any corners or take any chances. Gratitude, excitement, worry, readiness - those were all there.
After getting the call around 5:15 pm, getting to the hospital and admitted by around 6:20, and then waiting, and waiting, and waiting...I was finally being wheeled into surgery and saying good bye to my husband and family members. I can't imagine what it was like on the other side of those doors for them, waiting for the hourly updates on the status of surgery. No one wants to be the one on the inside, but there is no doubt in my mind that they all had the harder job. Sometime between 7-8 in the morning, the surgeon called my husband to tell him the new heart was in and was beating on it's own! I can't even imagine that moment for him.
I of course wouldn't write this without taking a minute to say how incredibly grateful and blessed that this heart went to me. Although I still don't know any details, this had to be a match made perfectly for how fast it came compared to how long some doctors thought I would wait. I was and am honored to know the family of my first donor, Taylor, and hope in time that I am able to develop the same loving relationship with the new donor's family, as well. I pray that during what I imagine had to be the hardest days of your life, you were able to find some solace in the fact that you have now given me my life back. There will be an unmeasurable amount of things that I can do now with this strong heart - things that I would have never been able to accomplish before with the disease. I will honor this heart, just as I honored Taylor's, and its impossible to take the small, simple things for granted once you have been given the gift of life.
This has been an amazing answer to prayer and has continued to bring my faith closer to God. The fact that I went into the transplant as healthy as I did only means one thing: I will come out of it with a quicker and stronger recovery. The magnitude of this blessing cannot be described. Just remember, if you're in a rut, you're having a hard time, things are feeling like they are spinning out of control - your miracle is coming. That's what I was told, that's what I believed, and it did!
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