I Am Shocked! Shocked I Say!

Health Update:  For those who haven’t been following my blog for long, I’ve spent most of the last decade suffering from non-continuous Atrial Fibrillation (AFib), which is an irregular and rapid heart rate that occurs when one or both of the two upper chambers of a heart experience chaotic electrical signals.  Basically “AFib” is a fast and irregular heart beat.  The heart rate in atrial fibrillation may range from 100 to 175 beats a minute.  My most common symptoms include: chest palpitations, sweating, a shortness of breath (difficult to fully inhale) and a “feeling” of weight on my chest.  Most of the time my symptoms are brief – a minute to a half hour.  My most frequent symptom is the chest palpitations.  Occasionally, the symptoms double up or last longer.  Rarely, the symptoms go to three and or last more than 90 minutes.  When that happens, I go to the ER.
Just to be clear, many folks live with continuous AFib for decades.  As my cardiologist told me:  “Most AFib patients don’t die from AFib.”  They die from blood clots and related illnesses:  stroke, deep vein thrombosis (DVT) and pulmonary embolism.  My AFib has been non-continuous.
To make a longer story briefer, on 24 September, about 3am, I woke up with very strong palps.  I take my blood pressure (BP) three times a day.  In the morning, I still had the palps and my blood pressure and pulse were elevated, and my pulse was irregular (in AFib).  That evening, although not experiencing additional symptoms, I went to the ER.  They gave me a top-up on one of my meds and sent me home with instructions to contact my cardiologist ASAP.  I called the following day and arranged for the first available appointment – which was the following week (Wednesday, 30 September).
So we met and he put me back on a blood thinner (to prevent blood clots / strokes) and scheduled me for a COVID test and a visit to the hospital for an Electrical Cardioversion.  An electrical cardioversion is when the doctor uses a defibrillator to zap your heart to disrupt the electrical misfires and set you back into a normal heart rhythm.  In computer terms:  “A cold re-boot.”  This will be my second zap.  My first was back in November 2017.  In cat terms:  I’m on life two with seven to go…
I had the COVID test on Monday and today I got the “all clear / negative” results back.  I am scheduled for the “DFib” on Friday (in two days), so please keep me in your thoughts and prayers.
“One thought can produce millions of vibrations
and they all go back to God… everything does.“
—   John Coltrane
From his poem:  “A Love Supreme“
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On This Day In:
2022	Trails
2021	Three Or Four Elements
	Something In My Eye (Operator)
2020	I Am Shocked! Shocked I Say!
	But You Gotta Have Faith (When You’re In Love With A Beautiful Woman)
	But Only Half
2019	…And Bullet-Proof Suits
	The Bottom Line (Is No Surprise To Me)
2018	What Do You Hear?
2017	I’ve Got A Pocket Protector
	Word Up!
2016	Better Value
2015	Any Port In A Storm
2014	Babies (II)
2013	Why The Young Stay In College Longer These Days
2012	Perceptions Of Worth
2011	Flavor
2010	Giants Win 1-0 !!

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Day 5: Getting Easier

The end of day five and the start of day six…  Two more days to complete the first week of blend fasting.
Morning weight:  364lbs.  (on Day 6)
I am down / down “1/9”.  As in, 1lbs down from yesterday and 9lbs down from my fasting start weight:  373lbs (morning of Day 1).
I feel like I’m starting to get my second wind.  I am feeling great in the mornings and try to do things and then get tired easily.  All of this is normal until the fat burning really kicks in.  I do feel like I’m already getting thinner and (like I said) feeling better / healthier.  Part of it is purely psychological as I can see the goal – of completing week one – now clearly in sight.  I will wait until I see how I feel on day seven to decide if I’m going to the modified alternate day fast (MADF) or if I stick to the juice blend for some additional time.  Last year, I did my week and then kept going for almost seven weeks (41 days).  I pretty much said:  “Let’s go for two weeks and then day to day.”  Which is what I ended up doing…
I was planning to go for a swim in the evening, but when we drove by around 6pm, the pool was still packed with families.  My local homeowners association has two BBQ’s a year:  one for Memorial Day and one for Labor Day.  The are used to mark the “official” open and closing of the pool season.  At the discretion of the association board the pool can be opened earlier and stay open longer.  Last year (2018), we opened at the start of May.  This year, almost at the start of April.  Last year, we closed after Halloween.  This year it looks like the end of September.  We are hoping to resurface the pool (after 20 years), and the Board wants the pool closed as soon as our permit clears to make sure we are able to open on time next year / season.
My point about the families being I don’t like to swim laps when it’s crowed because folks want to have fun with their kids and I’d be tying up a whole lane just for my laps.  So, no swim, but I did get in my 30 minute dog walk.  C’est la vie…
My hands, wrists, feet and ankles are consistently not bloated and my Blood Pressure is starting to consistently drop into the “good” range.  I had my first 118 / 81 in quite a while.  Not perfect, but much better than the 135+ / 85+ I’ve been registering lately.  When I’m getting 115 / 75 in my morning reading, I’ll be happy.  That’s a great number for any age, let alone 64, pushing 65 years old.  My average resting Heart Rate is now down in the 50 / 51 per minute range.  That’s down from the 55 / 65 is was for most of last month.  I’m not a fully convinced believer in the maximum heart beats in a lifetime theory, but it seems oddly consistent across species, and I think it deserves more research.  And, yes, I’m fairly OCD and measure my BP/HR two to three times a day.  I was doing it religiously for several years (and charting them over time).  I showed my Excel file and charts to my cardiologist and he said I need to chill out as this kind of compulsive behavior can result in increases to both BP and HR.  That was a couple of years ago, now.  I no longer chart the results and I mostly just do morning and before bed – and, maybe once or twice a week during the afternoon.
In some future post, I’ll try to explain what I mean by “eat less”, “move more” and “eat healthier”.  For now, I’ll just say “eat less” doesn’t necessarily mean eating fewer calories…  (more later!)
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On This Day In:
2022	True For All Arts
2021	Driving To Your Destiny
	Angels (Angel Of The Morning)
2020	It Almost Certainly Will If #45 Is Re-elected
	Sssshhhh (The Sound Of Silence)
2019	Deciding, Doing, Done
	Day 5: Getting Easier
2018	Thought Experiments
	Day 38: Going Crazy
2017	Which Did You Learn?
2016	Shape And Limit
2015	Me Either
2014	Just Business
2013	Beautiful Adventure
2012	Precedence
2011	Ya Think?

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Speed Spoils

Well, another day gone.  Another day closer to retirement!
I didn’t sleep well last night.  I’m not sure why, perhaps it was the late night cuppa-tea, but I had one of those “Inception” nights where you have a dream which seems absolutely real (virtual reality real), but you know it’s a dream.  I can rarely remember the whole thing when this happens, and this dream was no exception.  Anyway, I was in some kind of CSI / serial killer tracking police squad and we were trying to track some deranged wacko.  I can remember very few details:  I wasn’t a cop, I was only working with them.  The crimes were gruesome.  We never caught the “perp”.  I remember thinking, “This is not me doing this, so I must be dreaming.”  At that point, I stopped being a player in the drama and became an observer of the drama and myself as a performer in the drama.  That sense of duality there was pretty weird, too.  I woke once, just after mid-night and when I went back to sleep, I went right back into the dream.
As I said, I don’t remember much more about the details of the dream.  I do remember feeling close to consciousness several times and thinking, “Just relax and go back to the dream.  We might still catch him.”  Anyway, and like I said before, the more I thought about the awareness of dreaming, being in the dream, the more I thought about the movie “Inception“.  Hil woke me at the usual time (4:30 AM) and I was still in the dream.  I’ve always thought dreams were fairly short lived affairs.  The dream itself might have a duration of some length, but the actual time dreaming was seconds or minutes.  This dream really seemed to take all night and (as I said) I woke up feeling like I hadn’t slept at all.
Other musings:
Hil and I went out for another trip around the neighborhood.  This was a little over an hour, but much slower.  I reckon we walked about 2.5 miles.  My BP was more or less normal and my pulse was in the high 80’s and regular.  That’s two days now with no “known” irregular pulse.  Woo-hoo!!
On my daughter’s (Rebecca) recommendation, I’m having a little play with scheduling the release of my quote posts.  I’ve set two up to go off tomorrow and the next day.  I’m not really comfortable with the concept of timing posts this way as it seems deceptive somehow.  If something strikes my fancy today and I create the post today, is it misleading to publish it later?  Doesn’t that give the impression I had that thought later?  Fortunately, almost no one reads my little disturbances (ripples) in the time-space continuum, so my ethical itches will remain unscratched (or at least uncommented on).
And finally, I’m reading about computer greats and one of them said something I’ve believed for years but never really knew how to express (I paraphrase):  If you’re developing software that has lives dependent on it, it has to be perfect.  If you’re not, then you need to get it (the software product) out to the users as quickly as possible so they can tell you what’s wrong with it (what needs improving, not that it doesn’t work).  If you get a reputation for faster results, the market (your customer) is more forgiving.  But they still end up being more demanding in the end.  Speed spoils.
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On This Day In:
2023	Courage To Love
2022	Pass A Voting Rights Act For Democracy’s Sake
2021	Tomorrow President Biden Starts Wrestling
	Good-Bye #45 (The Tears Of A Clown)
2020	The Burden Of Faith
	On To Superbowl LIV (54)!!
2019	Are Your Dogs Barking?
	Dangerous Waistcoats
2018	And 40+ Years Later?
2017	He Is Alone
2016	Compensation
2015	Charlie Redux
2014	The Crux
2013	Erosion And Rechannelling
	Alliance, n.
2012	How Many Thought… (One I Know Of)
	Choices And Decisions
2011	Speed Spoils
	Simply Intended
2010	A Second 4 Hour Jog

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A Single Heartbeat

First off, I need to give a big shout out of thanks to the Doctors, Nurses and staff at Mount Diablo Medical Center!!  Without you I would not be here tonight blogging…
If you’ve been following this blog for the last few entries, you’ll know I was supposed to go on a 120 day assignment for work back to Baltimore, Maryland.  My flight and room had been arranged and my bags were packed…
On Friday (7 January ’11), I started feeling palpitations in my chest around the base of my throat.  Now I’ve been experiencing palpitations for at least the last five years when I had to go to the Emergency Room for IV’s to bring my heart rate down.  I’d get them every couple of months, generally they last a few minutes – maybe up to a half hour, and then just go away.  I’d discussed them with my cardiologist and he said I was probably just becoming hyper-aware because of my ER experience.  Anyway, I went to the nurse at work and she took my blood pressure and pulse.  My BP was fine, but my pulse was a little elevated (for me), around the high 90’s.  I asked her to check my pulse manually.  She asked why.  I said because the machines aren’t very good at judging irregular pulses and I only trust people for that.  She checked and found my pulse agreed with the machine, but I was correct and my pulse was irregular.  She asked me the standard questions about how I felt and since everything else was fine, she said I could go, but cautioned I needed to go see my doctor or to the ER if my symptoms changed.
The palpitations went away, but I still didn’t “feel” right the rest of the day.
Later in the day, a friend at work came up to me and said she had to give me a hug and say goodbye.  I asked what’s up and she said she had a dream something terrible happened to me while I was away and she felt she would not be able to live with herself if she didn’t say goodbye to me.  We laughed, but I could tell she was serious.
When I got home, I checked my BP several times and it remained normal with an elevated pulse (and the irregular indicator flashing).  I took my BP the following morning and it was the same.
I went out for a driving lesson with my son, James, and we stopped to do a bit of shopping while we were out.  I was fine walking around, but when I’d get in the car, I kept feeling a tightness in the center of my chest.  Not pain, just pressure.  While we were out we bumped into a colleague from work who was out shopping with her family.  Her husband was also going away on a business trip and we had a little chat.  He advised me to check my flights as a number of them were being cancelled due to the bad snowstorm on the east coast.
When I got home, I checked and, indeed, my flight had been cancelled.  I hastily rebooked for another flight – this one going to Baltimore via Detroit.  My original ticket was for Baltimore via Atlanta, but Atlanta was closed due to the weather.
The tightness in my chest was not going away so I discussed it with my wife and we decided it was best to go to the ER – just to get it checked out.  It was probably nothing, but just to be safe…
Well, to make a longer story shorter, they put me on a bed and started running IV’s into me.  They were very reassuring, but I felt like I had to tell my story to every nurse and doctor who popped their head in my room.  Having said all this, there is something definitely NOT reassuring about being told three times, “Don’t worry!  You’re in the safest place in the county to have a heart attack.”
Needless to say, around 6pm, I had a panic attack!
Now I’ve never been overly sympathetic for folks in the movies or on TV who suddenly can’t breathe and start screaming…  Let me tell you, I have a whole new attitude about it.  It may look ridiculous on screen, but when it’s YOU – it ain’t funny.  More precisely, it is terrifying!!
I suddenly felt like I was locked in a vise and it was crushing my shoulders together.  I felt myself gasping for air, but I could not take any in.  I was screaming (at least in my head I felt like I was screaming), but I’m not sure how much noise I was actually making with no air.  Hil went out into the hall to get the doctors and nurses and they came in and calmed me down.  Shortly after that, it was “happy-juice” time in the ol’ IV.  That calmed me down and the decision was made to keep me for overnight observation and a stress test in the morning.
Hil went home to the kids around 11pm.  I’m sure the whole experience had scared the bejesus out of her (it sure did out of me)!
The night was uneventful.  They wake you up every now and then to take blood, give you more drugs and to make sure you don’t sleep to well through the night (just kidding about that last part).
In the morning, it was off to the treadmill for my stress test…  Now, for my age, I’m only supposed to get up to about 140 for a few seconds to complete the test.  Well, standing there getting wired for the test, my pulse was already 135-138.  And I wasn’t even moving…  The nurses decided they didn’t want to do the test without the doctor present – so we waited a bit.  My cardiologist showed up and he restored their confidence and we got on with the test.  As it happened, I guess I passed because his whole demeanor changed and he pronounced me fit to go home!!
We had a chat about my drugs and not exercising for a week (to start) and about being careful.  He advised against my trip, but said he couldn’t stop me if I insisted on going.
Jumping ahead, I had to speak with another doctor before I could be released.  He also advised me not to travel.  In the end, Hil and I talked and we agreed for me to stay.  Trooper that she is, Hil said, “I’ll support you if you go, but I don’t want you to because I don’t think it’s safe and you’re not well.”
When we got home, I called my Center Director and she agreed it wasn’t a good idea to travel so soon.  She assured me the most important thing was my health and other opportunities would come along.  I thanked her and began the process of cancelling my flight and room and committing to staying.
Today marks one week since the start of the palpitations…  Hil has unpacked for me.  She has really been a rock for me this week.  I took two days off to adjust to my new meds and have now been back at work for three days.  Everyone has been supportive at work.  I’m still keenly aware of my chest/heart/pulse, and every now and then there is an almost exquisite sense of terror that my heart could stop any minute now.  Today, Hil and I went for a short walk – about five blocks.  My legs feel leaden and my chest feels hollow.  No pain or tightness, just not full.  I guess it’s the new drugs working at slowing my pulse.
In a way, I feel as if I’ve been given another chance at life…  Hil and I curl up together at night to reassure each other and it all seems so precious and yet so fragile…
I have loads of new topics to blog about:  atrial fibrillation, blood thinning, fear, renewed hopes, love of family, warm sunlight and fresh air, and the simple joy of being alive…
My New Year’s resolution of walking at least a half hour every day this year doesn’t seem like such a trivial accomplishment anymore.  Technically, I’ve already blown it for the last seven days.  I think I’ll forgive myself for missing it this week.  Slowly, slowly, get better every day…
And that single heartbeat — the most important one — it’s the next one!
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On This Day In:
2023	I Hope Blogging Counts Too
2022	Republican Ambling
2021	I’d Argue Wealth, Then Income
	Knock Him Off His Feet (Mighty Love)
2020	Steppin’…
2019	Every Vote Counts
2018	Or A President
2017	Pleasures
2016	Why Not?
2015	Je Suis Charlie
2014	To The Nines
2013	Higher And Truer
2012	Life’s Last Question
2011	A Single Heartbeat
	A Little Male Humor – WHY MEN SHOULDN’T RETIRE

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