Cardiac Catharsis

 Cardiac Catharsis

    When I was six weeks old, I was diagnosed with aortic stenosis. The largest valve in my heart was too narrow, restricting blood flow to the rest of my body. In another century, a different place, without access to capital, I would die quietly before the age of two. Thankfully, doctors intervened and saved my life. A tiny balloon was inserted into the valve and inflated, giving me breathing room for the next two decades. The valve was still damaged, but I lived a normal childhood. I mastered the monkey bars, ran cross country in high school, and traveled abroad in college. Still, with each pump of my heart, blood leaked backwards into my body. My heart was increasingly overworked, straining and swelling against a ribcage that had stopped growing in my adult body. At twenty-seven the regurgitation was torrential, and my heart was as big as a bull’s. It was time for a new valve. 

    Living on borrowed time, I was unprepared to process my fear of death. I was scared and felt alone. When I told close friends and family about the corrective surgery, I saw concern and care in their eyes, but also incomprehension. Not many could grasp the gravity of what was to come. Wanting to put them at ease, I steeled a brave face and assured them that everything would go smoothly. But my body betrayed my true feelings. I trembled in the groove of my chest that was soon to be ripped open. I told myself that the impending surgery was a culmination of a lifelong health project, but I was unsure if it would bring relief – or oblivion. Unable to bear the weight of my predicament, my soul broke down a few weeks before my procedure. I wept into my partner’s shoulders outside the Christmas shops at Bryant Park. I was overwhelmed by the crowds, the lights, and my inability to escape the boundaries of my own mortality.

    I hoped for clarity during the surgery. I would be on the brink of death – surely I would have a life changing epiphany, a bearing of the soul that would reveal deep truths about how to heal and live my life. But as my body was undergoing the most traumatic beating of my life, my mind was deathly blank. One second the anesthetic mask was being put over my face, the next I woke up with a whale sitting on my chest. My body had been shattered and I could barely breathe, but my mind felt like I had blinked and woke up in a new reality. I had no conscious recollection of what had transpired, but my mind strained to imagine a faceless medical team hunched over my prone body, slicing through my flesh and bone while I lay unable to cry out. I felt supremely violated – and grateful to be alive. My mind was making up stories but my body remembered everything, swollen and beaten in a hospital bed. My mind/body connection had been severed, and the road to recovery was predicated on mending this bridge.  

    Recovery is grounded in struggle, and my healing was a culmination of collective labor and care. On the first day I walked, gaunt but alive, flanked by nurses and family. At home, before my daily walks around the block to increase strength and endurance, my mom had to tie my shoes because I couldn’t bend down. My body was unable to keep the winter chill at bay, so my dads brought me warm sweaters which they lifted over my aching chest. My sister drove up from Philadelphia to tell jokes and offer the solace of company, and friends visited to cook meals and play cards to nourish my spirit. My partner held me through the nights as I moaned through the pain and discomfort of my chest bones fusing back together. Co-teachers at school assured me that I should take ample time to recuperate before returning to the classroom as they covered our classes in my absence. Students drew me heartfelt cards and wrote poems, cheering on my recovery. I was poised to return to school two months post-op because of the village it takes to rehabilitate a cardiac patient. 

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    In November of the previous year, all Department of Education employees received an email regarding the October 7th attacks and subsequent bombardment of Gaza. We were advised not to “express personal views about political matters during the school day,” instead asked to “expose our students to objective facts and multiple perspectives, allowing them to make their own judgments and grow as independent and critical thinkers.” These sentiments were framed as guidance, but it quickly became clear that they were not made in good faith. A co-teacher decided not to teach a lesson on Zionism and Palestine because she was “unable to teach in an unbiased manner.” Colleagues from other schools were quickly disciplined for supporting student movements bringing attention to children shredded to pieces.  As I was relying on my job’s benefits to pay for a lifesaving procedure, when I spoke the words “Nakba,” “genocide,” or even “Balfour Declaration,” I was afraid I would be hustled out and removed from my post. The teacher’s union had won hard fought gains for good coverage which paid for my half a million-dollar surgery. Still, health care reliant on employment demands compliance even, if not especially when, educators are asked to compromise their values. 

    Upon my return the rules of engagement remained difficult to define, which let employers set the standard for “objective facts and multiple perspectives.” Students across the country mobilized to end the violence in Gaza, using tactics they had learned from the civil rights and anti-apartheid movements. They manifested the very goal of civic education – for “students to be engaged community members who can think critically and are empowered to chart the course that our city and country take.” The actions of brave students demonstrated to those in our classrooms how much collective power they wield. City officials responded by ordering police to brutalize our young people. Many high school administrations showed solidarity – with law enforcement. On career day, military recruiters far outweighed other professionals. They extolled the virtues of their service, including college tuition payment and home loans. These benefits greatly appeal to young working-class men and women, a small price to pay for loyal marching to the drumbeat of empire. I was pulled into the fray after I remained sitting during the performance of the national anthem. The guidance counselor told me that if I “wasn’t going to stand at graduation, [I] shouldn’t bother coming.” Freedom of speech and the right to peaceably assemble are foundational rights we teach our students in American history, but they are quickly rescinded once it threatens the ruling class grip on power.  

    The veins and structures of our school systems are like those of a heart. Heartbeats set the body’s pace, while schools keep the tempo of society. Hearts pump blood and vital resources into healthy tissue. Schools nourish minds and bodies, equipping young people with the tools and knowledge they need to grow into caretakers of a robust society. My surgery and subsequent recovery were successful because of the love, trust, and resources invested in me. The same is not being afforded to our young people today, even though they are the core of society. They are ignored and invalidated, their dreams and visions for the future repressed, sometimes violently. This system is not sustainable. A leaking heart valve, like that of a neglected school system, if left untreated and restricted, ends in only one outcome – rupture.  

Zander Bullock is a high school teacher in the Bronx, where he was born and raised.