Thoughts Before Surgery: Those Who Appear and Those Who Don’t
- Lavavoth
- May 26
- 13 min read
Updated: May 28
The Inherent Risk of Surgery
...If things don't turn out well, if I were to die during surgery or afterward from complications, what are some of the final thoughts I'd want to hold from this planet, this reality, that still give me a sense of wonder and awe?
One week from yesterday, on June 1, I will return to the hospital for my next procedure, a hemi-thyroidectomy. As of now, only half of my thyroid needs to be removed, unless my surgeon discovers additional evidence of cancer during surgery or the pathology report later reveals further malignancy requiring complete removal. If all goes well next Monday, we will monitor things post-operatively to determine whether my remaining thyroid can still produce enough hormones on its own so that I may avoid lifelong thyroid medication.
I’m not keen on undergoing this procedure, perhaps even less so than the total bilateral mastectomy in October 2025, and part of me would just as soon refuse it altogether. But at this point I am trying to extend my life through surgery alone, since chemotherapy and radiation are off the table for me.
Approaching midnight at the hospital in Burlington, Vermont on October 17, high on intravenous OxyContin and wondering why Hans didn’t visit me under anesthesia as he had during my hysterectomy in 2018. You can hear just how out of it I was in my barely audible voice. I bonded with the nurse who cared for me throughout the night. Each time he came in to add more Oxy into my IV line, he’d tell me frightening stories about difficult patients, hospital chaos, and the trouble he used to get into during his youth in Boston (we’re the same age). I remained awake for most of the night and into the following morning, celebrating in my own sedated, bed-confined sort of way as if it were my birthday or I'd just won the lottery, grateful to have survived the surgery.
So today I’m sitting with my thoughts and wondering: if things don't turn out well, if I were to die during surgery or afterward from complications, what are some of the final thoughts I'd want to hold from this planet, this reality, that still give me a sense of wonder and awe? The list is long, and within it are countless personal experiences I could speak about.
But today I want to focus on only a few things that have stepped forward recently, the people, videos, and music that remind me of what I've loved about being alive. They carry a kind of reverie as well, reminders of Hans, of who he might have been had he incarnated beside me, or perhaps of who I imagine him to be now in the afterlife, moving through it with the same supernatural presence that so often leaves me breathless and wanting more.
As I sit with these thoughts, I take 75mg of Tramadol [1] as I listen to Chantress Seba’s “You Are the Light,” a song I have shared on this blog before, though it’s worth resurrecting here. Its melancholic and contemplative atmosphere, along with the altered-state quality that slowly unfolds through the music, is suited to this moment. Certain songs are like temporary locations we step into when reality becomes too sharp around the edges.
Michiana: "It’s beautiful, but really flat, don’t you think?”
Later, Hans would confirm he was intervening through him, a thing he’s done numerous times through others. At the time, I had become so focused on finding property in response to Hans’s repeated prophetic phrase, “It’s time for a change,” that I stopped listening to my own hesitation about leaving Vermont.
This was a witchy satchel I left in Hans Bach’s forest in the hopes that those handling the estate sale would accept my offer. They did.
Listening to this brings me back to the summer of 2024 when I first heard "You Are the Light" on Hearts of Space and then replayed it incessantly for weeks afterward. That was the summer I drove to northern Michigan, guided in part by Hans Bach, the deceased man [2] whose former home, surrounded by acres of forested land, had gone up for sale. I couldn’t find anything in Vermont, so my attention drifted toward the Midwest instead. But in the end, I couldn’t picture myself there. The land was too flat. The roads were too straight for a person like me, a lover of literal and metaphoric unexpected twists and turns.
My former student, V, who I’ve brought up previously, a Mennonite [3] who still checks in on me from time to time, understands this instinctively. Like me, he has family roots in Michiana. He called me unexpectedly on Sunday (5/24) from the road after leaving Indiana, perhaps sensing on some psychic level that my surgery is approaching. He has done this repeatedly since we first met in January 2023 when I was still his adviser. V is an exceptionally intelligent young man whose religious upbringing and the labor demands tied to his family’s hundred-plus acres of land prevented him and his siblings from attending public high school.
A fawn at Hans Bach's property, June 17, 2024.
Back in 2024, while I was literally walking through the woods surrounding Hans Bach’s property, V called, after not having spoken to him in several weeks.
“Hi, I was thinking about you and I wanted to see how you were,” he said.
I laughed. “I’m literally in the woods of northern Michigan as we speak, in the process of buying a home.”
He laughed too. “So we have that in common too, huh?” He said, referring to our connection to Pennsylvania and that we both drive Subarus. “I was just in Michigan. It’s beautiful, but really flat, don’t you think?”
We spoke for half an hour about the forest, land management, and the extraordinary beauty of Vermont. Later, Hans would confirm he was intervening through him, a thing he’s done numerous times through others. At the time, I had become so focused on finding property in response to Hans’s repeated prophetic phrase, “It’s time for a change,” that I stopped listening to my own hesitation about leaving Vermont. If Hans had been trying to tell me this was not the right place for me (which he was), I couldn't hear him directly, so instead the message arrived through V, who also physically resembles a younger version of Hans in uncanny ways (not the first time he's used someone with similar features either, as he has been doing this since 1994), and who carried the same calm, grounding energy I sometimes lack.
The moment V described Michigan as beautiful but too flat, I realized instantly the Midwest was not where I belonged (Minnesota included) and that Vermont was home. In many ways, he rescued me from what would've become one of the worst regrets of my life. There have been several moments throughout the last three years when V has appeared at exactly the right time, calling when I needed grounding most, always starting the conversation with, “Hi, I was thinking of you…” V is a Virgo, ruled by the same sun sign under which Hans died.
So I think of V now, especially after he offered prayers for me on Sunday, something that brings tears to my eyes as I write this now. V knows nothing about Hans, nothing about my spiritual practice of shamanic paganism, and likely never will. Perhaps during a hike together in Stowe, if I sense enough openness, I’ll share those aspects of myself. But over the years I've also learned that not everyone I care about needs to know every hidden part of me for the connection itself to remain authentic.
Ildar Young-Gaynutdinov: Über Human & My Endless Love for the Evolution of Dance (and Music)
[Dance is] also one of the most erotic forms of connection two lovers can share. There's an intuitive synchronization that occurs when two bodies fully align through rhythm and movement, and when that connection truly happens, you feel it physically in your heart.
This piece landed on my YouTube feed several days ago. There's something supernatural in the fluidity of Ildar Young's body, particularly in the way he folds, extends, and contracts through space with such extreme articulation and control. His movement combines elements of contemporary dance, contortion, animation, and experimental floorwork, producing an uncanny effect where the body appears to defy ordinary anatomical limitation. At certain moments his spine undulates in a serpent-like manner through sequential articulation while his isolations, off-axis balances, and abrupt dynamic shifts create the impression that gravity itself is behaving inconsistently around him. The choreography by Zoï Tatopoulos amplifies this effect through tension and asymmetrical lines that alternates between predatory precision and near-collapse.
With his hair dyed close to Hans’s natural color, it became easy for me to imagine Hans moving this way in spirit. I imagine us dancing together like this, our bodies freed from ordinary physical limitations, bending into impossible positions while strange music pulses around us as part of the ongoing mythology of our relationship.
The track itself, “Piteous Gate” by M.E.S.H., contributes to the atmosphere. The piece can be described as experimental electronic, darkwave, and synth, a kind of deconstructed club soundscape. Metallic percussive textures scrape against alien, biomorphic auditory landscapes and bass frequencies while fractured rhythms emerge and dissolve without settling into any kind of predictable repetition. The song incorporates dissonant synth layering, abrupt spatial shifts, and heavily processed industrial sound that is simultaneously mechanical and like a ritual in progress. There is very little melodic resolution. Instead, the composition sustains a suspended unease, existing within an altered or liminal psychological state. It's extraterrestrial, weirdly erotic, dystopian, and futuristic all at once, which makes it fitting for the themes that run throughout my work and my relationship with Hans.
For me, dance remains the ultimate form of expression. It's one of the most cathartic ways to release trauma and stagnant emotional energy from the body. It's also one of the most erotic forms of connection two lovers can share. There's an intuitive synchronization that occurs when two bodies fully align through rhythm and movement, and when that connection truly happens, you feel it physically in your heart. It becomes something beyond performance or technique. It’s a soul-level union, which is perhaps why I wasn't surprised when Ildar Young and Evgenia Medvedeva eventually fell in love and got engaged in 2025 after partnering together on the dance program “Starry Dances.”
That Evgenia Medvedeva is a dark-haired brunette with brown eyes only intensified the synchronicity for me, reinforcing that I was meant to encounter Ildar’s work. It wasn't only because he physically resembles a more supernatural, heightened version of who Hans once was, but the recurring image of the blond man paired with the brunette woman continues to appear throughout my life in ways that are absurdly specific. Over time, these repetitions are a persistent symbolic language through which Hans keeps attempting to communicate just how much he loves brunettes, how much he loves me.
The “Twin Soul” Conundrum and the Irrelevance of the “Grandfathered-In Clause”
...The soul incarnates in order to grow, expand, and encounter a wide range of relationships and experiences, often in separation from the twin soul so that each being can evolve independently toward its fullest potential.
My undeterred allegiance to Hans, a conundrum that makes many people, even those who accept or partially embrace our bond, question the depth and permanence of my connection to him. The truth is that I have no one else in my life I can consistently count on in the way I have counted on him. Hans has been here through everything for more than three decades, guiding me, loving me, teaching me painful lessons, and will eventually lead me home to him.
I understand why this type of bond is difficult for many people to comprehend. Ironically, despite Hans being supportive of me in finding a living partner or spouse in this lifetime, particularly anyone who entered my life before his arrival in 2010, or what he jokingly refers to as the “grandfathered-in clause,” it has become nearly impossible to find someone open-minded enough to enter an intimate relationship with me. The difficulty often doesn't stem from disbelief. In many cases it's the opposite. People either encounter Hans's paranormal playfulness or sense something emotionally and spiritually real enough about Hans that they feel threatened by him or by the permanence of my attachment to him.
That realization brings tears to my eyes, the fear and reluctance in others, and the fact that my will to continue living remains intertwined with Hans and my need to tell our story. Perhaps that alone says something about the kind of life this has become for me, one increasingly oriented toward the idea of returning home to him because here, in this world, it has been extraordinarily difficult to find someone willing to genuinely build a life with me while also accepting Hans as part of it.
Part of the difficulty stems from the widespread romantic belief that we incarnate solely to reunite with a singular “twin soul,” as if every meaningful connection must be measured against that framework. But my experiences have led me to view things differently. I believe the soul incarnates in order to grow, expand, and encounter a wide range of relationships and experiences, often in separation from the twin soul so that each being can evolve independently toward its fullest potential.
Because of this, we naturally form profound soul-level bonds with others throughout our lives, connections that are vitally meaningful to our development even if they are not “the twin.” Yet the people I've attempted to connect with romantically seem unable to move beyond the idea that, if Hans is my twin soul, then their own twin must still be elsewhere waiting for them. In many cases, that fear or uncertainty pulls them away from the relationship before it has the chance to fully unfold.
What they often fail to consider is that their twin soul may never cross paths with them in the idealized way they imagine. That person may not even be incarnated. They may exist only in spirit, or they may be alive somewhere else in the world, living an entirely separate life shaped by their own lessons, relationships, and experiences.
In this sense, my temperament is probably better suited for somewhere like California, where people tend to approach spirituality and unconventional relationships with greater openness. But I’m never moving to California. Living among Vermont’s mountains and forests has made it difficult to imagine myself anywhere else.
Notes
[1] Tramadol is an atypical opioid agonist that also has SNRI-like properties affecting serotonin and norepinephrine. I have been taking it intermittently, usually three to four days on and then several days off, during periods when my depression becomes especially severe. I learned about these effects accidentally during my total hysterectomy in 2018 when my surgeon prescribed Tramadol for post-operative pain.
After experiencing a fecal impaction from hell while taking OxyContin in the hospital and during the bilateral mastectomy recovery afterward in 2025, I remembered the more positive experience I had with Tramadol in 2018 and later asked my PCP to prescribe it for pain management instead. For me, it was significantly less constipating, and it also carries a lower addiction risk than OxyContin when used appropriately. By the end of January, I had fallen into the worst depression I have ever experienced in my life and, with my doctor’s blessing, began taking Tramadol intermittently to help lift my mood.
Unlike traditional SSRIs or SNRIs, which often require weeks before mood-related effects emerge, Tramadol noticeably lifts my mood almost immediately after taking it. For me it's also highly energizing while simultaneously reducing pain. I take only 75mg per day and try to be extremely cautious about maintaining the medication’s effectiveness over time, which is one reason I avoid taking it continuously throughout the week.
[2] There were so many strange synchronistic connections mentioned throughout the obituary. His name was Hans, like the alias I use for my beloved (Hans). He was from the same German state as Hans. He became a pilot. He was an Aquarius, one of the astrological signs I have always felt a kinship with. He was an artist. His wife died on my birthday. Like Hans, he was born in a town that borders the Black Forest. He was also born the same year as Hans and even physically resembled him in certain ways. The accumulation of these details were so overwhelmingly strange that it compelled me to drive eighteen hours (with a stop in South Bend, IN) just to see and sense the place for myself, even if only to spend time with him and his property for a few hours. In the end, I spent nearly two full days there alone. The realtor, who was based several hours south in Detroit, gave me the passcode and allowed me to come and go as I pleased.
[3] Not exactly Mennonite, but part of a smaller Anabaptist Christian denomination that branched away from the main faith tradition. Their lifestyle and dress resemble Amish customs in many ways, though the sect V belongs to embraces traditional clothing and religious practices while still permitting modern necessities such as cars and cellphones.
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