Saturday, I’ll celebrate forty years of survival. I’ll begin by listening to George Jones sing, “He Stopped Loving Her Today.” That song was popular in the summer of 1980 and brought Ken to tears as he worried about me.
On Friday, the thirteenth of June, 1980, I came home after spending three weeks at St. Clare Hospital in Monroe, Wisconsin. My left lung had collapsed and was surgically removed because I had histoplasmosis, an infection caused by a common fungus found in the soil, often from bird droppings. During my final check-up,I’d asked the surgeon, Dr. Curry, “Is there anything I can’t do?”
The physician, a brusque man, replied, “Do anything you want to.”
“How about things I don’t want to do?” I was thinking of housecleaning.
“Do those, too. It’s good for you.”
I was tempted to tell my husband that the doctor had said I was no longer able to do heavy housework, but I never lied to him. Besides, if I was going to play the invalid, I’d have to go all the way. I was afraid something would come along I wanted to do that was just as strenuous as vacuuming and scrubbing. I could hear my husband asking, “How can you do that if you can’t clean the house?” I’d follow Dr. Curry’s advice.
At first, I was anxious. My large incision healed quickly, but I wasn’t comfortable wearing a bra until after the new year. The only time I’ve noticed a change in my stamina was during a short trip to Las Vegas. Ken and I needed to hurry to catch a bus on The Strip. He ran but I found I could only walk fast. He prevailed on the driver to wait for me. Most of the time, I don’t even think about having one lung.
Have you survived a serious illness?