My friend Lilian, another heart transplant recipient, put it best recently about what it was like getting discharged home after a hospitalization. “Like great, I’m in my 30s, clinging onto my mom post-shower like a naked sloth, this is so great.”

This is exactly what my thoughts were yesterday, as I was clinging onto my mom post-shower after my second hip replacement in less than five months. Cold, naked, hoping that her frail body wasn’t going to fall over as she tried to carry me onto the chair so that I could get my sad little sweatpants on. One pant leg at a time over the course of five minutes.

My poor parents have temporarily relocated to the east coast for the next few weeks, yet again (deja vu number three) to help me out because their daughter just can’t seem to do this adult thing on her own.

I brought it up to my parents this morning. “When you were my age, I was like in kindergarten. Did you think you’d literally be doing the same exact thing and helping me out, making me food, even teaching me how to walk again, 27 or 28 years later?”

“Well it’s a good thing your apartment has such a nice view of the city, because at least we have that going for us,” my dad said, understanding my dry humor. They then, of course, went on to say that they loved me, and that they are parents, and that parents are here for a reason, and that this is nothing for them, and … wow, I just honestly want to go hug all of the parents out there right now for having so much strength and love for what they do. Thank you for all that you do for your children. Parenting will forever scare me and I find it to be the most formidable job of all.

Give me an ICU full of multiple dying patients, and I can handle that with grace and ease. I will save lives. Give me my own child and … I will surely call my parents for help.

Anyways, the reason I had to get another hip replacement was the same reason that I had to get my first one— avascular necrosis. This was caused by the steroids that I took for the heart transplant early on in 2019. Many patients go through this unfortunate & debilitating joint disease. Just another “by-product” of what we have to deal with as transplant patients.

However, it is nothing compared to the alternative: death.

Every time, I remember what it was like when I was trying to figure out “What the F&%# is wrong with me? Why can’t I breathe?” the night before my heart stopped working, the night before The Infamous Admission. Those awful hours in the ICU, wondering if I was going to even make it to see another day in this world. Counting the number of things I would have done with my life if I had been given another chance. Laughing and crying at the irony of it all, and bargaining with myself that I would never complain about anything if I was just able to get through this hellish life event, just this one time.

…

I then tell myself: take a deep breath, Alin, and remember, you can get through this. It’s just a freakin’ hip replacement. Stop overthinking it.

To end this post, I suggest picking up the following books to read, as they are guaranteed to change your life:

Katherine Standefer’s “Lightning Flowers” (pictured below) & Matt Haig’s “The Midnight Library”