SallyGanoJones

February is Heart Month.

For me, personally, I just celebrated my 6yr “Valveversary” last week.

For my readers that may not seem significant, however, I was struggling to breathe six years ago prior to receiving an aortic valve replacement. The feeling I’ve described to family, friends, & physicians is that I felt I was being slowly suffocated. And I was. My tests prior to surgery showed that my percent of oxygen was below 30%.

I’m doing well now and my tests show my oxygen input and output are in normal range since my surgery six years ago. Many prayers were answered.

Why am I writing this now?

This is Heart Valve Disease Awareness Month.

“Listen to your heart!” says the campaign. I encourage my family and friends to listen to your heart.

My symptoms were ignored by many of my doctors even though I was fainting and falling and extremely fatigued. (Even fainting& falling downstairs!) Any testing done for me in years prior to my severe condition being found here in Tulsa missed the issue.

A job change brought my husband and I to Tulsa, OK, seven years ago. Looking back on this significant move to a new city, I realize how God was at work to not only bless my husband with a new job, but to bring me here to the extraordinary heart care I needed at the time.

One morning I drove myself to an urgent care and asked a doctor, “My chest hurts; can you tell me I’m okay?… because I don’t feel okay!”

He listened carefully, took my blood pressure, and other vitals and responded as he gave me four aspirin, “No ma’am, you’re not okay! I’m sending you to St. Francis (hospital)!”

This was the turning point. At Tulsa’s St Francis Hospital, my heart team administered a number of tests. One of my cardiologists (who had performed heart transplants) thought my symptoms were not “adding up.”

He ordered additional tests, and found a “congenital heart defect.” This was the beginning of my recovery. Surgery was scheduled six years ago this month. I did three months of cardiac rehab and learned so much about cardiac care from the staff at my hospital.

So I want to encourage my readers: please listen to your heart!

Ask questions. When your heart aches, it’s trying to tell you something.

I’m so glad I listened to mine. And I am here writing this to you now because I followed through and found what my heart was trying to tell me.

Listen to your heart.