{"id":2285,"date":"2012-02-13T15:35:19","date_gmt":"2012-02-13T23:35:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rayivey.com\/wordpress\/?p=2285"},"modified":"2012-02-13T15:35:19","modified_gmt":"2012-02-13T23:35:19","slug":"my-second-birthday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.rayivey.com\/wordpress\/my-second-birthday\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"rss\"<\/a>\"instagram\"<\/a>
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Dr. Kathy Magliato: My Hero<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ten years ago today, I was admitted to Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Beverly Hills.\u00a0 I had been ignoring increasingly serious chest pains for ten days.\u00a0 I cannot defend this behavior, other than to tell you that I have actute “white coat hypertension” – meaning I’m terrified of doctors, doctor’s offices, and hospitals.<\/p>\n

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This time the fear nearly killed me, because when I finally went in, my main cardiac artery was 97% blocked.\u00a0\u00a0 In other words, I was a walking corpse.\u00a0 Later I learned that the type of lesion I had on my artery had a nickname in the cardiac healthcare community:\u00a0 The Widowmaker (http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Widow_maker).<\/p>\n

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Lucky for me, Dr. Kathy Magliato and her talented team at Cedars swooped in and saved my life.\u00a0 I’ll never forget the first thing she said to me as she leaned into my hospital bed and shook my hand:\u00a0 “Mr. Ivey, you have a beautiful heart.\u00a0 There is nothing wrong with your heart.”\u00a0 It was an odd, but welcome thing to hear from the woman who was getting ready to cut me open and rewire said heart.<\/p>\n

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Dr. Kathy was ridiculously kind and calming.\u00a0 She was way nicer than surgeons are supposed to be, and I’ll always be grateful to her for that.<\/p>\n

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I as, of course, beside myself with terror.\u00a0 Lucky for me, my friends and family immediately began taking care of me.\u00a0 Bonnie kept me calm while I was being admitted.\u00a0 My Dad flew in from Louisiana, slept on a shelf in my hospital room the night before the surgery, and took care of me for two weeks.\u00a0 My friends Tayler, David, Anita, Ellen, and others made sure I had visits.\u00a0 My cousin Sheryl was her usual championship self.\u00a0 Even my boss, Erica, visited me while I was in ICU.\u00a0 That’s hardcore.<\/p>\n

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Thanks to Dr. Magliato, I received a second chance at being alive.<\/p>\n

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Average Rating: 4.7<\/span> out of 5<\/span> based on 245<\/span> user reviews.<\/span><\/div><\/p>

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