FEAR, FACTS, CORONA AND BOVINES

I am not known for being an emotional decision maker, but I am no Spock from Star Trek either. When I look at the decisions I have made in my life most have been after an analysis of the facts, sometimes overly so. When I look back at the decisions that I have made out of emotion, some were made out of love, some hate, some anger, some joy, and some made out of fear. As I reflect, I will submit to you that my worst decisions were the ones that I have made when fear was the driving emotion.

I know everybody has their own fear stories, but from my perspective I believe that I have known real fear. Not fear of losing a job, or my newly driving teenager having to drive; I again reflect on the three days I spent in the hospital with an erratic, to no heartbeat with the doctor trying to keep me alive long enough to make it to my open heart surgery. It wasn’t my plan for the weekend. I was actually doing yard work that Saturday morning and having lunch at Wendy’s with my daughters when my heart began to fail. Imagine dying at Wendy’s restaurant, how embarrassing. “I will have the baconator and large fries”, Bam! Dead before I can even pick it up at the counter!

Later that Saturday in the ER my heart surgeon was telling me how horrible the surgery was going to be and even more so, how challenging the recovery was going to be. “Doc” I was curious, “what are my other options?” His response was stoic, “you can have the surgery, or you can die, those are your options.”

This choice wasn’t as clear for me as it would seem, Randy (you are on first name basis with your doctor after he holds your heart in his hands) didn’t paint a great picture for recovery. Fear was present and persistent over every minute for the next 3 days as I waited for my sternum to be cut in two and the cow valve to be sewn into my heart. Friends were calling me and failing in their attempts to console me, “they do this surgery all the time” but for me it wasn’t “all the time.” It was an extremely rare event. In fact, I recall thinking in my past, I will never have open heart surgery. It just wasn’t in my life plans. Now I am staring down probably two more similar events as these cow valves don’t last as long as I would prefer. Apparently, the life span of a cow is around 10 years and I supposed they all die of mitral heart valve failure.

Recognizing that fear is a horrible basis for making decisions I acquiesced to the surgery and waited two more days frozen in fear while they tried to keep blood flowing in the right direction through my body. Ok, the reality is my wife made me sign the papers agreeing to the surgery. My point is I was afraid, and I am still afraid of having to do it again. It wasn’t fun the first time and I am guessing the second or third won’t by enjoyable either. Waking up for the six weeks after surgery surprised you survived the night is an amazing experience I don’t recommend. Over two years later I still have those mornings.

Fast forward to the Corona Virus. I see so many people with so much fear. I am witnessing bad decisions from numerous politicians, business leaders, employees, friends, family and enough bad stuff on social media to even see bad decisions that strangers are making. This is a good time to self-assess your situation. Are you making permanent life decisions based on fear? Or are you making life decisions based on fact? Fear driven decisions are future mistakes that you will have to live with and eventually overcome later by facing another fear that was created by today’s fear driven decision. Fear multiplies exponentially with every poor emotionally fear driven decision that you make.

Folks, I submit for your consideration that our best course of action is to make no fear driven decisions other than to stay the course on the direction you had prior to Corona Virus. When I read that the expert’s models are off by over 800% and instead of 2,000,000 people dying its going to be 200,000 and now they say they really don’t know, I fear the experts more than the virus. When I hear the kill rate is going to be over 5% and now its under 1%, I fear the experts more than the virus. Due to the facts, the fear these people originally propagated seems to have lost its validity. I am just refusing to make a decision based on fear created by faulty data. I didn’t then and I am not now. I even have my family telling me that I am at risk because I have a cow heart valve installed in my heart. I will be vastly more concerned when somebody shows me the first cow that dies of Corona Virus. 

Worrying about what could happen will not reduce your troubles tomorrow but it will steal your peace today. Be smart but don’t be fearful. Take precautions, wash your hands more, don’t touch your face but don’t be fearful. Fear won’t save you from death, but it can certainly keep you from life. Focus on living more than fearing. Take it from me and my bovine heart valve, its not easy, but the alternative is to live in fear which isn’t living at all.

Apologies to my wife but the only person that has truly held my heart has been Dr. Randy.

Leave Nothing to Chance,

David