My medical history was pretty unremarkable for most of my life. No surgeries. No broken bones. That all changed in June 2006. One night while laying in bed, I could feel my heart doing something strange. It was nothing I could pinpoint, just kind of an awareness of each and every heartbeat. I asked my wife, Melinda, to listen to my heart. She held her ear to my chest and said that it didn't sound normal, it sounded like the sound from a seashell. She asked if we should go to the hospital but I said lets wait and see what happens. This episode lasted several minutes and then went away. In the back of my mind I wondered if this was the start of some impending serious heart trouble. I had always thought to myself I was a heart attack waiting to happen if I did not improve my health before I hit my forties. By the next day this was all pretty much forgotten.
Two weeks later it was back. I had spent a long Saturday working outside to the point of exhaustion. Instead of water I opted for can after can of sugar-laden pop. Once I got home I was starved from working all day so I downed a whole pizza late in the evening. Little did I know but this was all the perfect storm for triggering a certain type of AF (there is more than one type). Just like 2 weeks before, my heart started acting up once I was laying in bed except this time it didn't go away. I decided not to say anything to Melinda and went to sleep albeit slightly worried. Somehow I slept through the night. When I woke up I could tell my heart was still not right. I still didn't say anything to Melinda and decided I would go ahead and get ready for church and hope it would go away. After getting ready I thought I would try to take my blood pressure. I had been monitoring my BP with a new machine for about a month because my doctor had been concerned about high blood pressure.
Try after try the BP machine refused to give me a reading and displayed an error instead. Now I'm starting to get concerned. I could feel my pulse in my arm during the BP testing and I could tell it was very irregular. I checked my pulse and besides being irregular, I counted 30 beats in 15 seconds. Now confronted with a resting heart rate of 120 BPM my concern was quickly changing to a panic. About that time Melinda noticed my expression and asked what was wrong. I told her I thought we should go to the hospital. Those aren't the words a spouse ever wants to hear. I want Melinda to share her experience here as well so look for her perspective in future posts.
My panic didn't get any better on the way to hospital. This was one of those rare times I told Melinda to drive faster. Quick poll here: does anyone like going to the emergency room? I don't. The only good thing about presenting at the emergency room with chest pain or pressure is they get you in really fast. They had me hooked up to all kinds of stuff in no time at all. I think we saw my heart rate hit 145 once or twice. I'm not a needle guy so getting the IV was great fun (actually it wasn't that bad). Bless the ER doctor who had to deal with two pretty scared people but, how do I say this, his persona did not exude confidence. He would come in our room every now and then, look at the heart monitor, contort his face one way or the other and say "Hmmm...". Okay, Hmmm what? They did give me a drug (Cardizem) via the IV to slow my heart down. My heart rate would slow to 100 BPM for 10 minutes per dose and then climb back up again.
After a couple of hours of this they told me they were going to admit me to the hospital for monitoring. This ranks well below going to the emergency room in my book. They checked me into a lovely 4-bed ward and I exchanged my church clothes for some hospital pants and this really cool hospital gown (the cool part comes from all the ventilation you get from that wonderful opening in the back). I think they threw in some color-matched footies but in this getup I was hardly making a fashion statement.
A half hour or so later a new doctor comes in and introduces himself. I asked him if he knew what was wrong with me. He said "you've got atrial fibrillation, hypertension, and diabetes". The picture that comes to mind here is the old Batman fight scenes where the TV screen flashes POW!!!, BANG!!!, KABOOM!!! I guess it was my fault for asking. Just 24 hours earlier I was a normal healthy adult - well that just came to a screeching halt. Lets start with number one, "atrial what?" I asked. "Atrial Fibrillation. The good news is it is not life threatening." Those words were the first relief we got from all the anxiety we had been feeling. The plan was to keep me there overnight to see how I did.
I had the 4-bed (one TV) ward to myself until about 12:30 AM. I was having a hard enough time trying to sleep in the strange surroundings and then on come the lights. They rolled 2 guys in who have been in some kind of accident. They must have been 3rd shifters on their way to work because the guy next to me wanted to watch TV. My first night in the hospital with heart problems and my stress level is not doing so good. I eventually asked if they could move me to a different room so I could get some rest. They did move me but I found out resting in the hospital is pretty much impossible anyhow. They send people in all night long to check vitals and the lab folks show up bright and early every morning to see if you have any blood left.
The next day was filled with lots of fun activities, just like being on a cruise ship. There was an echocardiogram (ultrasound of the heart), we got to meet with a diabetic educator, and then there was the chemical stress test. They wouldn't let me do the standard exercise stress test because my resting heart rate was still in the 130s. I was more than a little nervous about having something injected into me that was going to do who knows what to my heart. The doctor told me not to worry and that if anything happened he would be right there. Well I feel much better now, don't you? The drug (Persantine) they give you for this causes a whopper of a headache as it wears off. They said caffeine would help the headache diminish quicker. My caffeine drink of choice would have been Mountain Dew but all they had was coffee that tasted like turpentine. I kept expecting it to eat a hole through the bottom of the coffee cup. Melinda wouldn't touch the stuff (she's the coffee drinker of the two of us) but I drank most of it out of desperation for any kind of relief.
Note for customer service: I'm sure this is not normal but the nurses I had seemed to enjoy telling me lies. They kept saying "you'll get to go home tomorrow". Well I heard this 3 days in a row. I considered telling them a lie of my own like "I'm related to George Bush" but I figured there was a 50-50 chance they would treat me worse then.
Tuesday afternoon my cardiologist told me the plan was to do an electric cardioversion the next morning. Right about then is when a healthy amount of fear set in. I grew up watching "Emergency!" so I felt I had a pretty good idea how this was gonna go. Roy and John get the orders from Rampart, open the little red suitcase, squirt some gel on the paddles and yell "CLEAR!!". Well, at least that is how I remember it. The guy that came in Wednesday morning to do my EKG said "I see you're scheduled for a cardiovert today". I said "yeah, I'm a little nervous about it". He said "don't worry, they give you some drugs so you won't even remember it. Even with the drugs though I hear some people scream real loud". Thanks to him, I now know one thing I would never say to someone in my situation.
In reality the cardioversion was nothing. The last thing I remember is the doctor asking my where I worked. The next thing I remember was waking up and asking the nurse if it worked. She said "yup" and I said "Praise the Lord!"It wasn't much later that they let me put my church clothes back on and wheeled me out for Melinda to take me home. I felt like I had been released from prison - or from one prison anyhow. We decided to leave the blue footies behind but I did take a few extra things home with me from the hospital:
- Three new medical ailments to bring up when everyone else starts talking about their medical problems.
- At least 5 new medications including 6 days of one called Lovenox that burns when you inject it into your stomach (did I mention I'm not a needle guy?)
- A sense of uncertainty about my life going forward.
You deserve a medal if you read this far. Please check back for more of my story.
Dave
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