My Own Private 9-11

I imagine there are few people over a certain age who do not know something about the horrible events of the September 11, 2001 attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States. The four coordinated suicide attacks on that Tuesday morning were shocking, devastating and resulted in many changes to the routine ways in which some things are conducted in the U.S. and throughout the world. I am not a good enough wordsmith to add anything cogent to the millions of words already written about the horrors. I don't have a photo or film clip to present. I was nowhere near any of the individual events. I was distracted that day. I had to learn much of what I know about 9-11 by reading and discovering long after the fact. For I, too, had been focusing on the 9-11-01 square on the calendar for some time. I had personal business to conduct on that day.

I was downstairs chatting distractedly with Ex, making the coffee, even though I would not be allowed to drink any that morning. That seems odd now - that little snippet. He was perfectly adept in the kitchen, by now acting as menu maker, shopper and cook. Why I, coffee hound, was messing with the makings when it was denied me is unclear. Likely I had insisted. I needed to keep my hands busy while my head spun out of control.  Amber came down the stairs with an odd look on her face. While getting ready for school, she'd seen the first news bulletins on TV. She didn't fully comprehend what was happening (who did?), but she knew she should likely say something. "You know those twin buildings in New York? You guys better turn on the TV." We did so, and I have a sense of us staring like two slack-jaws at the screen, comprehending no part of what we were seeing. At the time we switched on the set, all eyes were on New York. Then the Pentagon was hit.

I knew my mother would be preparing and drinking her coffee in the north county, and I knew there was no chance she'd partake of news delivered by any media. She is a TV-phobe, not very interested in hearing about anything remotely resembling news. She likes floating around in her own world and her own head. She would soon join Ex and me at a hospital, for I was to have surgery that day and we'd all made careful plans to support me and to support Amber so she could have as normal a day as possible. Nevertheless, we felt Mom should be told what was going on. She can't always be allowed to float along in a bubble. "Mom, dust off the TV and turn it on. I think we may be at war." She asked a good question, given the hour: "With whom?" I didn't know. Anxiety was creeping up on me. I already had a good sense of fear and dread going on. I didn't have much fiber left with which to deal with the attacks. "Just turn it on, Mom. We'll both be available on cell phone. Please take yours out of your purse and turn it on. We're going to the hospital as planned."

Amber had seen and heard enough. She'd been offered some options for her day. She'd landed on going to school as usual and walking afterwards to Aunt Becky's. Her dad would pick her up for dinner and they'd come to see me in the hospital after their meal. She'd been made to understand Mom wouldn't be very frisky and they'd only stay a few minutes, just so she could see I'd come through surgery and now was on the other side. The breaking news distressed her - she was 11 - and now she wanted to simply spend the entire day with Aunt Becky. We actually preferred that. We wanted her in one known place rather than two places with a solo walk in between. Oh, yes, it was Lemon Grove. On her walk, she'd pass the homes of a few different relatives in a 6-block walk, but we still favored her being in one location with a person we trusted 100% to make good decisions.

Amber and I had had a Mom-Daughter sleep-together the night before, bunking in her waterbed playing music we both loved, talking as needed. I don't believe our hands ever ungrasped, even through the sleeping hours. We woke from time to time, both crying. We were scared. We were a well-counseled family, the bulk of that bestowed on me, a bit less on Ex and a sanitized version applied to Amber, appropriate to her age and understanding. Even my mother had been let in for a little bit of preparation. For this surgery was going to drastically change me, and - therefore - everyone close to me, everything I did, everywhere I went, everything I thought, felt and emanated. We were in for some change. I was 49 years of age. I was very reliable and predictable. Good old Les. A rock. The one you could count upon to remain steadfast. I wasn't known for changing up anything in any way.

At the hospital, I was ensconced in the corral where pre-surgical patients wait together in their anxiety and misery. The staff members were clearly distracted, patients' families gathering in front of TVs in the various waiting rooms. I heard one woman make a tart comment to her companion: "Hey, I'm having surgery. Can I get a little attention here?" Though my procedure was scheduled for the afternoon, I reported at 7:00 a.m. and was given an IV. This caused me to need the bathroom 2 or 3 times an hour, dragging my little pull-along contraption with me. I remember feeling absolutely frozen, begging warmed blankets which were produced repeatedly with a smile. Between them, Ex and my mother managed to both keep me company and monitor the news. And finally I went from the corral to the chute. "Bye, Mom. Bye, Ex. See you on the other side." In the chute, my hair was covered, I got a light sedative in my IV (odd, because I'd toughed out many hours without sedation and now I was about to go completely under, but sedate me they did). The nurses there were also distracted, chatting among themselves. One commented on a grisly TV scene wherein body parts could be seen on the roof of a New York building. I didn't think much of that in my sedated state, but she apologized to me for being too graphic. And suddenly, "he" was there.

By pure happenstance, one of the world's recognized front runners practiced his specialty at his clinic and at the hospital 5 miles from my home. I was - once again - the chosen one, the lucky child, to be in his care. I was his third surgery of the day. "Do you know what's happening in the world today or have you been too busy to hear it?" He said he knew about the attacks. "Are you distracted in any way?" He said he was good to go. "OK, then I am, too. I have an 11-year-old who is relying on you to be as expert as you are." He promised to do his best. I suffered a few slight indignities in the operating room, such as meeting the crew that would film my surgery. And then I was mercifully removed from consciousness.

I have said many times in writing that I have suffered more than one addiction. My surgery was to help me with but one of those. I walked into Alvarado Hospital that morning weighing 340 pounds. I'd been gaining toward that peak for many, many years. Though I had managed such things as a successful career, a pregnancy and childbirth, international travel and many more of life's most wonderful gifts, I was now beaten down with nowhere else to turn. I'd tried every reasonable remedy but I'd succeeded in nearly destroying myself. My surgery was Roux-en-Y gastric bypass, the hard way. I was not a candidate for the less invasive laparoscopic procedure. It would color everything that came afterward. Not all outcomes have been joyous. Amber calls 9-11-01 the day she lost her mother. That is an enormous and powerful statement she means completely. My truth is that this was the first enormous gift I gave myself in order to find myself. The 10-year journey has been one of tremendous highs and a few deep lows, those not directly related to the surgery or its results. I wouldn't change a thing. The enormity of the impact of all of my changes cannot possibly be expressed in one blog post. I will continue to write about them, though. I have wanted to write of this for a very long time, as it is such a deeply integral part of the me of today. And - there - now I have done so.

A few things I know: there are enough of "us" now that we know 5 years post-surgery, 80% of us have gained back 50% of our excess weight. I am not one of those. Knowing what my skeleton, blood, muscle and other parts should weigh, I was given a number that - if I reached it - I should accept with good grace and call it a day. I weigh 35 pounds less than that number, without ever once taking extraordinary steps to cause more weight loss. I know about infections and torn staples and all the other horror stories. I read the same news reports you do. I just haven't suffered any of them. I know "they" were right to counsel us about the number one side effect: broken relationships of all kinds. Though Ex and I had been together 30 years and scoffed at the notion my surgery would break us apart, the marriage collapsed in 13 months. I know that not everyone is happy for a person who finds her way out of a terrible trap. Mostly people want things to remain the same. For most of us, profound change is too difficult to contemplate.  Good old Les. She changed everything in one fell swoop.