Surgery for Me on Thursday

In three days, on Thursday July 15th, I will be undergoing some pretty involved surgery, centered around replacing a defective heart valve that I was born with and repairing the lifelong damage from that defect.  I am confident that all will go well and I will make a full recovery and be able, before too long, to return to my active lifestyle.  But in the meantime I've been told that following the procedure I will be in intensive care about two days and in the hospital a week...if all goes according to plan.  After that it will be me at home recovering for a few weeks, with physical therapy naturally involved in the process.  For that hospital stay at least I will not be writing anything for this blog. But if you keep checking in during that period, you'll still find articles here: I've written them in advance! Hopefully, once I'm back home I'll be able to resume writing and posting.  It was late 2011 when, after going to an "after-hours" doctor for a sinus infection, he detected a heart murmur and recommended I see my regular physician...whose tests began to uncover the problem. Subsequent tests the following January revealed the scope of the situation, and since then I've had annual exams and consults with my thoracic surgeon over whether to go ahead with the prescribed corrective surgery...this past April he finally came out in favor of it.  So here I go...