August 10

Today is the 25th anniversary of the daughter unit's birth. Its also approaching the fourth anniversary of her heart's failure and it is because of this that she and I spent today at Kaiser in Santa Clara for her annual big heart checkup. She has checks every three months but those just involve blood tests. The annual big one, though, involves a catheter inserted in an artery and threaded down to take a bite out of her heart.

I know. Ew. I sit in the waiting room, humming Janis Joplin's "Piece of My Heart", trying not to think about what's going on in the procedure room in the back, when I notice a couple across the room looking anxious and confused. Plus the young man was wearing a respirator - the kind painters wear. I moseyed on over, introduced myself and asked if they were transplant people. They were. He'd gotten a new heart just last Thursday. His experience and my daughter's were very similar. Perfectly healthy, caught a virus that killed their hearts.

We were talking about their transplants and the little old lady sitting with a whole different group (heart attack, I think), kept exclaiming "Oh my!" "Goodness!" and "Heavens no!" at intervals through our whole conversation. She was hilarious - I almost tossed in my uterine polyps and breast lump just to give her more material...


The daughter came out after her procedure, and I was glad my new friends had gone in already because this one hurt my girl a lot. When she came out there were tears in her eyes. She popped a percocet and a short time later got very relaxed. Then she had an echocardiogram, clinic visit and an xray. After only seven hours, we were done.

We toodled along back past home and to the county offices in Hayward. The daughter had to submit some paperwork for a job she starts soon. While at the County office with most of the population of the county, I discovered several things:
1. There are lots of fat people in our county.
2. Most of these fat people wear pants that are too small.
3. Too small pants on a too large body cause the flab to ooze over the waistband.
4. This is unattractive.
5. People who work in county offices don't get paid enough.

If we thought waiting in line at Kaiser and the county offices was fun, we found true joy waiting in line to leave the parking lot with all the other people who were trying to get the hell out of there because it was 4:30 and time to go home! I sang Happy Birthday to the girl just to remind her it was her special day.

When we finally rolled up the driveway, we were overcome with exhaustion and relief. My baby headed for the door and after I finished kissing the driveway, I joined her. I was thrilled to be home but I was mostly happy to be home with her because her life is truly a miracle. Plus I'm exhausted. And my nearly perfect hub made burgers for dinner - with pepper jack cheese.

All in all, not the birthday I'd choose for anybody but we made the best if it. We laughed a lot and gave her her presents before dinner. Then she went out for ice cream with her friends. If you take away the heart biopsy - you might even call it fun! Next year, though, maybe dinner and a show...