The Feisty Fontan

I really hate the term heart failure. Nothing makes my little Type A personality heart hurt worse than having the word failure attached to it. Out of the approximately 79 diagnoses listed in my medical chart, seeing that one really breaks my heart.

Last week as I sat in my doctor’s office getting a dose of IV Lasix, because I was more than slightly fluid overloaded, I had this total “woe is me” moment where I felt like I was a complete and total failure at all I’ve done to recover these past few months. My heart was a failure, I was a failure, we both just sucked.

I then started thinking that maybe it would help to put my own spin on it and find a word other than failure to describe my heart function. I googled synonyms for failure. Yea, that was not helpful.

Heart deficiency? Nope. Heart decay? Negative on that one. Heart implosion? Yikes. Heart stoppage? That’s what I am trying to avoid! I finally decided that “heart frustration” would work because that was definitely how I was feeling…frustrated.

As I tracked every ounce of fluid and every gram of sodium that went in my mouth, my frustration grew, and I really began to wallow in it. The minute I hear the words “fluid restricted” I start dreaming of ice cold Diet Cokes and Route 44 Cranberry Limeades. I then become a troll to anyone trying to hold me accountable to not guzzling down either of those things.

A few days into my pity party I found myself standing at the bottom of these stairs. At the top of these stairs was an amazing ocean view and since a good ocean view is one of my favorite things in the world, I started stepping. As I walked, my dad passed me. Then his best friend. Then a gray-haired couple. Actually, a lot of people passed me. I had to stop four times to catch my breath, two of which I had to totally sit down.

Now, I have had people in my life who would have been annoyed with me in this situation; annoyed with how slow I was going. People who would have questioned why I just couldn’t wait at the bottom of the steps for everyone. People who would have wondered why I felt the need to push myself for an ocean view.

As I stood at the top of those stairs (trying to catch my breath, feeling dizzy as all get out, and knowing that my lips were probably the same color gray as my ill-chosen nail polish shade), the voices of those aforementioned people started to whisper. I turned around to look at the stairs I just climbed and told those voices to go eff off. Why should it matter how long it took me to get up the stairs? To me, all that mattered was that I got to where I wanted to go.

In that moment, I decided I should focus more my heart successes. It was a freakin’ struggle to get up those steps, but I made it. That’s a success. Some days it is a struggle to get out of bed and take a shower. The days that I do; it is a success. Sometimes my energy runs out before my errand list is completed or my house is clean. But what I do get done is an accomplishment.

On some level I can consciously feel every heartbeat in my chest which helps me to be aware of every heart success I have. Every heart success is another giggle I get to give my nephew, another cheesy dance move I get to do, another ocean view I get to see.

So, eff off to the F-word that is failure. I am going to live with my heart frustrations and revel in my many heart successes.