Gifts of My Magi
My Christmas in the hospital waiting for a heart transplant
Overnight snow powdered the streets on the first Thursday in December 2005, sugarcoating the sidewalk I trod to the hospital door for a scheduled medical test. My heart failure had advanced slowly over the past two years, marching me to this moment—a right heart catheterization to see if I needed a heart transplant.
Instrumental holiday music played in the background of the operating room as I reclined flat on my back on the metal table with sterile blue drapes pulled across my upper body, and I turned my head until my chin touched my left shoulder. This vulnerable position presented the jugular vein on the right side of my neck as the doctor threaded a catheter through an incision in my neck all the way down into my heart. There was no sedation for this procedure, just topical numbing at the incision site.
When he checked the pressures inside my heart, the doctor seemed surprised and asked his team to zero out and rerun the tests. When the second measurement yielded the same results, he came around the table and lifted the blue surgical drape covering my face.
“Tell me again what you’ve been doing?” he asked.
Looking up awkwardly from the corner of my eye so I didn’t move my neck, I said, “Well, Thanksgiving was last week, so I made a turkey for the family. I needed Jay to help me lift it in and out of the oven. The day before, I took Tim to the orthodontist to get his braces adjusted, and Saturday I drove Nik to the mall to get a new pair of shoes before he went back to college.”
The doctor shook his head in disbelief. “Most people in your condition are on bed rest.”
“I don’t have time for that,” I objected.
One of the nurses laughed. “Now that sounds like something a mother would say.”
The doctor smiled briefly behind his surgical mask, then became very serious. “You need to be admitted to the hospital. You need an urgent heart transplant.”
I squirmed on the hard table in the cold room, spotlighted by the harsh glare of the surgical lamps. “Can we do this after the holidays? I don’t want to mess up Christmas for the boys.”
He shook his head and caught my eye in a deadly serious stare. “You won’t live until Christmas.”
His words weren’t unexpected. I’d felt myself growing weaker by the day. My appetite had dwindled for the past two months, and I vomited when I ate more than a few bites. Deep down in the marrow of my bones, I knew I was dying. Still, I kept trying to play Let’s Make a Deal.
“My birthday is Tuesday,” I said, trying a different tactic. “How about I come back on Wednesday, and you can admit me then? I need to finish up my Christmas shopping, and I can have one last birthday dinner with my family.” I tried to fight the tears pooling in the corners of my eyes.
The doctor appeared to be choked up as well. He nodded. “Okay. Wednesday. Not a day later.”
Jay tried his best to transform my hospital room into a holiday wonderland, setting up a small Christmas tree and decorating my room with bright, cheerful lights and ornaments. Although the hospital was an hour drive from our home, he came to visit me several times a week, usually in the late evening. The nursing staff came to recognize him and never said anything when he arrived after visiting hours had officially ended.
Most weekends, he brought our younger son, Tim, who was thirteen, with him. Although I enjoyed seeing them both, I worried that the sight of the tubes and hoses hooked up to my body might be difficult for him, but Jay felt Tim should see and understand my condition.
Perhaps the avalanche of gifts that arrived at the house on a daily basis from my online shopping made them feel like they ought to get me something, because they kept asking me what I wanted for Christmas. I didn’t want to shatter their holiday by saying, “Don’t waste your money on buying stuff I won’t use because I might not live much longer.”
Instead, I asked for gifts I could enjoy in the moment. I asked Jay to bring my fluffy white terrier, Mallory, for a visit on Christmas Day. I asked Tim to play a song for me on his clarinet. He performed in the middle school band, and I wouldn’t be able to attend his Christmas recital this year, so I wanted him to hear him show off his musical prowess in my hospital room.
When Christmas Day came, Jay placed Mallory into an empty wheelchair at the hospital entrance and put a couple small gifts on the seat next to her, covering both with a white blanket that camouflaged her fur. She stayed quiet and still as they rolled her through the hallways and up the elevator. As Jay, Tim, and Mallory traversed the route to my room, the few employees they encountered just smiled and waved like they saw nothing out of the ordinary. The skeleton crew working on the holiday possessed zero concerns about visiting pets.
After three weeks in the hospital, I didn’t look or smell like the person Mallory knew. Multiple rounds of diuretics had flushed enough fluid out of my system to drop my weight below one hundred pounds. This, combined with my inability to eat much solid food, caused me to look gaunt and wasted. Dark circles rimmed my eyes, and my cheeks were hollow.
“Come here, Angel Bunny,” I coaxed Mallory, using her nickname.
Her ears perked up as she recognized my voice, and she cautiously crept from the foot of the bed until I held her in my arms. I buried my face in the soft fur of her neck and inhaled the sweet, slightly spicy smell. My fingers burrowed into the long, soft fur on her back. I felt renewed strength and hope flow through my body as I held her tightly and felt the steady beating of her little heart against my own.
“Dawn, are you ready?”
Tim had taken the clarinet out of its case and assembled it while I embraced Mallory.
“Yes, go ahead.”
Tim raised the instrument to his lips and played “What Child is This.” I’d requested this song for my Christmas present, and I listened raptly as he hit most of the correct notes while I held Mallory in my arms. As I lay in the hospital bed, surrounded by my family’s love, I felt I had received the best, and possibly last, Christmas gift of my life.
Dawn Levitt is a two-time heart transplant recipient, childhood/domestic abuse survivor, and an advocate for both humans and animals in recovery. She has published a personal essay with Insider.com, and her poetry has appeared in Wishbone Words and Blue Villa. She can usually be found walking her two terriers with her husband, attending a poetry open-mic, or eating tacos. Someday soon, she hopes to find herself in Paris. Follow her on X at 2HeartCore4U
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Wow! What a story. What an experience. I can see how this might have been your best Christmas ever. And it took place in a hospital, and while waiting to know if you'd ever have another Christmas. I admire the way I could see the almost-deserted hospital as your husband and son smuggled in contraband (your pretty little dog). And I love the way you infused the essay with emotion while somehow keeping it from being maudlin. That's a major achievement.
Thank you for giving us a window into your remarkable journey. I agree with Lynette— you manage to be fully authentic without tipping into excess sentimentality. You’d definitely have every reason to do so.