One of my succulents, given as a get-well gift by a patient, is flowering again. 

This is the signal that another anniversary has arrived. It is now three years since I had open heart surgery to repair my mitral and tricuspid heart valves.

Powerful memories from my time in intensive care still haunt me. I can’t tell you how time dragged, listening and watching my erratic heart recordings on the monitors, fearing that I would die of a stroke, especially after my GI bleed that necessitated cessation of anticoagulants.

Of course, there were some incredibly beautiful moments too: a nurse who gently washed my hair in the wee hours of the morning when I couldn’t sleep, another who kept me entertained with heroic stories about his colleagues, including my surgeon.