McCln's Story

My story begins just before I was even born. The doctor thought I was going to be twins because he thought he heard a double heartbeat. This was in 1964. I was born in 1965. I had yellow jaundice and one month later was diagnosed with heart murmur.

Several years passed and several cauterizations later, at age eight, I had my first bypass, repair on the aortic valve. And scraped some of the disease out of the valve. But was told, even then, that there was only a 15 year guarantee on the repair and would have to be replaced in the future.

The years passed and now it is over twenty years since the repair bypass was done. I was 36 and was finally told that I needed replacement surgery. I knew what my chances were from the repair bypass and was ready for this surgery. I had to go through four months of anger with a dumb, blonde, bimbo dentist before she finally decided to work on my mouth. I had told her that I needed to find out about infection. I still had not found out in the four months of her playing around. I finally went to another dentist to get all needed work done. While I was waiting on the bimbo, I developed CHF, the aortic valve had closed up while I was waiting to get dental work done.

Finally the day came twice. The first time, I had a small grade fever and the surgeon was not comfortable with doing it then. We waited three weeks and finally got it done. The bypass was a success. I am still here. My mother was an inspiration to me while she was alive. She passed over two years ago. But I knew I had to go through with the surgery. I was glad I did. I feel so much better about myself and am trying to lose weight. It was hard at first. But I am getting better all the time. I hope no one regrets their surgery. I feel that I would be sad now if I didn't go through it. 

I am proud to say that I am proud of those people here. You all are great and so am I. I met the challenge head on and here we are today. Helping each other. I can't say more.

Thank you.