12 Days

12 days until the wedding. I’m not nervous at all, well not about the lifelong devotion portion at least. Kel and I have been together for 8 years as of our wedding day. Over 8 years we’ve experienced the best and worst we have to offer, and this has undoubtedly made us a stronger couple.

What really makes me nervous is the fear that I won’t be able to live up to the high standards I’ve set for myself.

Can I be the husband that never holds a grudge too long and is always quick with a hug and apology for those times when I let my wife down?

Can I, one day, be the Dad I imagine myself to be? Loved and adored by my son (it’s in the cards baby!) for all that I am and am not?

Can I be the fair and equitable force in my family that is expected of myself?

Again, I’m not sweating the ceremony or the thought of spending my life with one person. If anything, that’s the moment I look forward to the most. The entire ceremony will be a blur, all but the two seconds when I look my bride in the eyes and say the two words we all sit so anxiously to hear.

Kel and I have been through quite a bit over the last 8 years, but I never thought the last few months would have been the most difficult for us.  Allow me to explain, it’s what I do.

In May I was having some pain in my shoulder and figured it’d be a good idea to get it looked at.  Since I had the day off for one appointment and had a bit of trouble breathing recently, I doubled up and saw my Primary doctor.  He did his rudimentary EKG (SOP for asthma patients) and suggested I go to a heart specialist, hmm.

Two days later I’m sitting in the office of one of the areas most renowned heart specialists.  He’s talking slowly and for the most part, simply.  From what I can gather he’s trying to tell me something is wrong, but all I hear are letters; SVT, WCW, WPW, SAP, etc.  I’ve got no clue what he just said.  The only part I’ve retained to this day is a blurb:

“It’s really quite fascinating because I’ve never seen readings like this before.  Look here, at about 3 in the morning your heart is beating around 170bpm and for no reason whatsoever, your heart stops and not just for a single beat cycle either. I mean your heart stops for a few seconds.  Then miraculously it starts up again in a completely normal rhythm around 50bpm.  You’re quite the interesting case.”

That’s when he went full on Barney with me and said I needed surgery, soon!  At first it didn’t register.  Then when it hit me that I needed a heart “procedure” I couldn’t help but think about how upset Kel was going to be.  We were 5 months from our wedding and all I wanted was to be strong for her throughout the process.

Over the next two weeks I got worse, fast.  My heart was working on it’s own schedule and I couldn’t keep up.  Walking up the stairs became a concern as I was afraid to do anything that may trigger an “episode.”  I could see that Kelly was taking it in stride when we sat together, but behind those eyes I saw her pain, her concern and her ultimate fear.

The surgery was moved up a week and happened to be on her birthday, awesome present right?  I didn’t sleep well that night and I could hear Kelly stirring around as well.  The next morning we drive to the hospital and didn’t speak much.  The first of us to speak was going to end up in tears, so we sat quietly as we motored up the highway.

The prep for heart surgery in a catheter lab is extensive.  I was the first to be operated on that day so all hands were on… me.  The nurses scrambled to get me ready and all those while Kelly sat alone in the waiting room.

She was allowed in shortly before I was carted off to the table.  I was smiling, cracking jokes and talking about how excited I was to be awake and see the inside of my own heart.  In reality it’s how I deal with situations where my mind is bugging out, and it works well might I add.

Kelly told me how she sat in the waiting room staring at the screen displaying which stage the patients were in (prep, pre-op, op, post-op, recovery). I was the first on the list to be shown as “op” but not the first to be listed as “post-op” or “recovery.”

The thought of being in her shoes makes my eyes heavy and my chest tight.  I can’t imagine the thoughts in her head when she sat for over 3 hours watching the screen after the doctors said the surgery should be “about an hour.”  It’s at these times we all fear the worst, and I wish I could have called to her and tell her I was fine and that we’d be done soon.

The hardest part about the entire experience was my inability to convince Kelly that I was going to be okay and that we’d get through this and be back on track to have our dream wedding.  When I brew up these stories again it helps me breathe easier.

How hard can a wedding ceremony be after all that we have been through?

Accidents, traveling, work, life, love, lost loved ones, and forgotten old friends… We have had quite the journey to say the least. From what I hear the easy part is over and the real fun begins when our two families become one. I think Kel and I are going to be just fine.