Limbo Land - The longest 45 minutes of my son’s cardiology checkup day

It’s checkup day. Tom’s has his blood pressure, sats, height and weight checked. Now we’re up to the echo. Otherwise known as limbo land. There is no other moment in life that makes me feel so much like I’m nowhere. We’re not living our normal every day life, we’re not in the clear, we’re not back on closer together checkups, and we’re not on a surgery waiting list.

In about 45 minutes, we could be back in any of those situations. Flip a coin and watch it land, and that’s about as closely as I can describe how we walk into these cardiology reviews now.

In 45 minutes, our life could go back to exactly how it was this morning. Or in 45 minutes we could be facing another surgery. We could be breathing a sigh of relief and walk out in amazement that Tom’s heart just keeps on keeping on. Or we could be going “oh man, here we go again”. We’re on borrowed time - have been for about 4 years - which is both miraculous and leaves us living on the edge on days like this.

Limbo land is where you feel like your life is literally up in the air. And you can’t focus. You try reading, but you just keep reading the same sentence over and over. You check all your socials, but can’t remember anything you’ve looked at. You could message people, but can’t really be bothered expending that much energy.

So mostly I just end up sitting and watch the world go by: people going in and out of clinic rooms, kids drawing, other parents in the same situation as you, hospital visitors getting excited about things you have seen so many times you couldn’t even count them.

It’s a weird feeling that I’m glad we’ve been able to stretch out to every six months this last two years.