Today is THE day.

So Sept 23rd, I was not only placed on the transplant list, but a new heart was found for me. They still needed go inspect the donor heart, to make sure it was good. Still, the feelings of these moments were overwhelming. Yes, I was happy, yet it many ways it wasn't real. None of what was happening to me was real. I'd talked about my nightmares, and somehow this was just as real. I was also afraid. Afraid of the surgery - you have to understand, while I'd already had 3 open-heart surgeries, this was the first that I was actually aware was going to happen. I was afraid of being put under anesthesia again, I was scared it was going to be like when I was in the coma - a never ending nightmare. Yet somehow I wasn't scared. I wasn't scared something would happen during the surgery or was I. Honestly, the shock of having found a heart so quickly was masking everything. My memory of this time is very poor. I remember getting the news from Felicia, I remember Reggie, my ICU nurse for the night telling that 1) my chest needed to shaved, again, 2) he would be the one to take care of me when I got out of surgery. I remember being told that there was actually a transplant that was going to happen before mine and that my surgery was being pushed back a bit. I remember waking up on the 24th, unshaven, and with very little sleep. James came to my room early because he'd promised to have breakfast with me. Of course, because of the surgery, I was NPO, and wouldn't be eating anything. What don't remember at all, is what time I went into surgery, at all. I do however, remember saying goodbye to Wendy as I was taken to surgery prep. I remember being cold in the OR and meeting the OR nurse, and the Anesthesiologist once in the OR (I'd met with prior as well), and I remember them putting me under. I remember Dr. Cunningham, who performed the transplant, coming into the OR, just before I went under.

You know what else I remember - I remember not being able to tell the difference between reality and dream. For the first part I was under, I was still aware of the ER, but it a a dream-like sense, I realize that it was a dream. I remember thinking, I just want to fall asleep and wake up and have it all be over. Unfortunately that didn't really happen. See I sort of remember bit and pieces and "feelings" of my dreams while I was under. I do remember, about halfway through, realizing that I was still under and thinking "I am sedated, they are operating on me right now" and then going about in my dream and talking to people. I thought "Dammit, why can't think just be over and can I PLEASE wake up". But it went on, and after the surgery, reality crept into my dreams. I remember seeing Wendy and Dr. Cunningham before I was technically awake. He asked me "How do you like your new heart?". I also remember being extabated but then going back to sleep and still being convinced that I was still sedated. When the ICU finally forced me awake. I was so convinced that I was still sedated that even told the nurse "No, I'm still sedated". It took me 5-10 minutes to be convinced that I wasn't still sedated.