Graduation...

Since my last post, I have had heart surgery at the wonderful Mayo Clinic, where an interventionalist repaired a rare heart defect I have, and next week, I start rehab to help with the leg problem that had me in a wheel chair and on crutches most of the past year.

The leg problem and heart problem were related, and now with the heart pumping blood how and where it is supposed to, I am ready to start rehab on the leg. Had I not persisted, I think my future would have been considerably shorter than I now have reason to believe it will be.

I am a grateful product of the fruits of perseverance, stubbornness and research. The heart defect caused problems all my life, but was not diagnosed until 2010. I then went to a round of doctors describing my symptoms to have them say that my symptoms could not be related to the heart defect... until I arrived at Mayo, where the doctors listened! And they made the connection and offered a solution.

I look back on my journey with this problem throughout my life, and even with the delays in getting help for it, I continue to believe that it's all progress, and it has all been gradual. I think it was Ovid who wrote (Someone please correct me, if not) that: "All things come gradually, and at their appointed time." The quote leads me to think about graduations of all kinds, of the many processes in our lives that occur in graduated stages, of how we do not graduate from school until we pass certain tests... and so goes life. We are given many tests to pass as we grow and mature. We are always in a process of graduating...and moving onward.

As I thumb through old journals, I see the same symptoms written down many times over the years: dizziness and  feeling that I was about to fall over or pass out were the chief ones I wrote down. As much as I mentioned these to doctors, no one thought to look at my heart, because I did not present "typical" heart disease symptoms. What a long journey it took to arrive at the time and place where this was resolved and my literally broken heart was mended. Now, the journey to finish healing begins. None of it sudden, none of it fast, all of it gradual, building toward a future point. More tests to pass in this graduate school called life, and after my first rehab session last week, I already know that many of those tests will not be easy ones. Still, they will represent progress, and that is good.

So, I am returning to blogging grad-u-al-ly and wish everyone a truly good next year, one that includes health -and stubbornness- should it serve you! May you gradually come into all the good things that await you at just the right place and time.