Open Hearts

If you follow me on Twitter you have been seeing my updates posts on my father. He had open heart surgery on May 15th to replace his aortic valve which had started to leak and was sending him into congestive heart failure. Luckily we have never really faced big surgeries in my family so this was a whole new experience for us. He made it through well and though there have been some bumps in the road he came home from the hospital yesterday feeling much better than he went in but still with a 3 month recovery road ahead of him. He has a cool red heart pillow that he needs to hug when he feels the need to cough, sneeze or laugh to keep his breast plate in place and continue the healing.

The experience has been an interesting one for me. It has been tougher than I would imagine to try and balance work, kids, parents and wife duties all at once. My mother doesn't drive in Boston so my older brother and I were in charge of getting her to the hospital each day to visit because that is where she wanted and felt she needed to be.

It was tough on my girls because they couldn't see their beloved Papa every day as they love to nor could they see their equally as important Nana because she was keeping such long hours at the hospital and often left before the kids got up and came home after they were in bed. Similarly, I was also not always there for bed time or morning wakings due to my efforts in trying to get my mother to and from Boston. Thankfully Gary took on a lot of the extra nighttime activities and morning routines to help me feel less guilty about the lack of home time.

But the whole experience made me wonder if mothers ever give themselves enough credit for all the way they extend themselves. My mother who showed incredible strength and grace having to wait to hear about my father and his progress during his surgery; seeing him just post-op with his intubation and central line. And the unconditional love she has showed for him to stay with him in his hospital room for 8 to sometimes 12 hours each day for almost 2 weeks. Yet she took no credit for this as it was just part of what she had to do. Amazing. I hope I have half as much as the courage she has shown.