Hope on a Half Shell

Measuring Shelf Life

Anyone else remember the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Crime-fighting amphibians. Heroes on a half shell. Some days I feel like a mutant, but not much like a ninja. I’m usually moving at a pace that could cause someone to mistake me for a turtle.

This time last year, I wrote this post about living a half-life. I had around 14 subscribers back then, so most of you haven’t seen it.

This post describes the half-life I seem to live after my second heart transplant. One of my anti-rejection drugs is a chemo drug that seems to work for immunosuppression purposes in transplant patients. Specifically, it helps to prevent or at least slow down a specific type of rejection called Coronary Artery Vasculopathy, and it only occurs in heart transplants.

In that previous post, I wrote about the way the drugs impact me and take away half my day, every single day, with feeling sick and tired. After begging my transplant team to allow me to take a break from the drug, they finally allowed me to stop taking it over the summer of 2023. It was amazing to have a few months without spending every afternoon sick on the couch.

However, at my annual checkup in October 2023, the doctors found that the arterial blockages had doubled in only a few months without the drug. Obviously, they put me right back on it, at a higher dose than before. I’ve returned to riding the couch every afternoon, sleeping for a couple hours to escape the feeling of sickness. But I have no other choice. Without the drug, my arteries will fill up with blockages and I’ll be dead in a couple years. Instead, I choose the half-life and the hope of a few extra years.

Photo by Paul Kapischka on Unsplash

I’m not here to complain about my troubles. Every day I get to see the sunrise is an achievement of medical science and human perseverance. Besides, everyone has their own problems.

When I was a child growing up with heart disease, one of my major symptoms was chest pain on exertion. Like most kids, I complained about the pain, but it didn’t get a lot of sympathy. I recall being in tears about my limitations and being unable to run around with other kids, and my mother’s response really put things in perspective.

“Quit feeling sorry for yourself. There’s little kids out there with no arms and no legs. Be thankful you’re not one of them.”

Although she was not a great philosopher, my mother had a point. Every one of us has our own problems, and given the opportunity, we would not want to trade our struggles for those of a stranger.

There’s an old parable that goes something like this:

All of the residents in a village were upset and crying about their personal struggles. Each one of them wanted to unload their burdens, convinced that others had better lives. A wizard or shaman or something of that ilk convinced them that they could all gather together in the center of the town during the next full moon and give up their burdens. All of the villagers gathered in a circle at the predetermined time, and when the shaman gave the signal, they all shouted their problems aloud. Springing from their mouths, the words transformed into bundles, wrapped in plain paper and tied with string, and landed in a great heap in the middle of the circle. As the astonished folk stared at the mountain of packages, the shaman commanded them to step forward and select a bundle from the pile to replace the one they had previously held. One by one, they stepped forward to pick up a bundle, but when they untied the string and viewed the contents, every person cried out in horror and threw the package back onto the mound. This continued until every bundle was unwrapped and rejected, then the townspeople cried aloud, beseeching the shaman to return their original burdens to them. They all realized that their familiar troubles were far better than the new and terrifying burdens shouldered by their neighbors. As they each gathered their original problems and pressed them back into their bodies, they became aware that everyone they met fought their own battles which might be greater or less than their own. It was then they learned that helping others to carry their burdens somehow made the weight of their own much lighter.

“Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind, always.”

As the sun rises on this new day, in this new year, ask yourself what you can do to lighten the burdens of others. Seek out others who desire to do the same. There is a great need for people to band together with the purpose of helping and healing. There are many agencies and charities and organizations who could use your support to help others in need. The need has never been greater. When you lighten the burden of others, you are also lightening your own.

Even after the darkest, coldest night, the sun still rises. Face the sunlight, shake off the weight, and allow yourself to rise.

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