Disappearance

Hi, just a quick note for now to explain my disappearance the past two days:  I spent the last two days in the hospital.  Here’s the whole story.  Tuesday, I was driving over to Champaign to go to Michael’s to get some Polymer Clay, because it’s on sale and I’m running low.  About half way over there, I suddenly got a very sharp pain right behind my left breast (like an electric shock).  The actual sharp pain only lasted maybe 10-15 seconds.  It took me a few seconds to figure out what was happening and it seems like it was “forever”, it took my breath away, it was so sharp and fast.  Then my heart started pounding so hard (not particularly fast, just HARD) I could actually feel the pulsing and beats (if I had a second hand I could have taken my pulse without even touching my wrist or throat).  Then the pain started across my chest and into my left shoulder and down my arm.  All this time I’m still driving along, wondering what in the world is going on and wondering if I should go to Carle Clinic when I got to Champaign.  By the time I got to Champaign, except for a tightness across my chest it was all over, so I went ahead and did my errands, went to Red Lobster for lunch and then went home.  Off and on the rest of the day and night, every once in awhile, it would feel like my heart hiccupped, the hard beating would start up again and I’d break out in a sweat, I checked my blood pressure and it was very high.  The next morning Verle urged me to go to the Dr. and get it checked out, or to at least call Gail and ask her if she thought I should get it checked out.  So, with both of them saying go get it checked out and the message at my Dr.’s office saying if you are having any kind of chest pain to go to the ER, rather than making an appt to see the Dr. I finally decided to go to the ER.  By this time all I have is the tightness across my chest and it feels bruised (like I’ve been tackled or something).  So, they did an EKG and blood work etc. and put a ‘Nitro Patch’ on me.  About an hour later, the nurse finally came back in and I told him I thought I was having an allergic reaction to the Nitro Patch.  He asked why and I told him my tongue was swollen and my tongue, and throat itched and burned and I was having trouble swallowing.  He lifted up the Nitro Patch and said, hmmm, it is pretty red under here, let’s take it off.  Verle said, later, well, you shouldn’t be too surprised, think about it, you know you’re allergic to Glycerin (tests years ago), what is a Nitro Patch?  Try nitro GLYCERIN, LOL.  The nurse finally came back in (about another hour later) and I asked for something to drink and were they going to do anything about the allergic reaction as I was having trouble swallowing.  He looked at the patch area again and decided to clean it off with some alcohol to get the residue off and said the Dr. said just wait and see if it got worse!!!   He sent somebody else back with a glass of water.  Around 1 pm I finally asked if I could possibly have something to eat as I hadn’t eaten in over 24 hours (since lunch the day before, since I didn’t know what they might need to do).  So he brought me a menu and let me order something to eat (off the cardiac menu, LOL).   The first blood tests came out ok, but the ‘hospitalist’ said she had talked to the cardiologist and they decided to do 3 enzyme tests 8 hours apart so they were admitting me.  So, finally (about 8 hours after I got there) they took me to a room, got me all re-wired (to a portable thing, so at least I could go to the bathroom etc.). 

Then, they did 2 glucose tests one around 4 pm and another at 10:30 PM and the final enzyme blood draw at 1:15 am and then another complete fasting blood profile (draw) around 5 am and then vitals around 6 am, so a second night of almost no sleep.  The 3 enzyme tests were okay so they decided we’d do the stress test, but wanted it fasting.  Guy came in and gave me a radioactive dye around 10:30, I went for the first ‘scan’ around 11:30, then did the stress test.  The Dr. doing the stress test told the students that normally they only take people to a certain heart rate but he decided to take me higher to see what happened!!!!  Then I sat for a half hour (I had to ask for something to drink and eat, but I was still marked in the system as fasting, so they wouldn’t give me anything to eat, although they did bring me something to drink).  They did the final scan and sent me back to my room.  Finally, around 4:30 the Dr. came in and said, although the Dr. doing the stress test was a bit concerned about my stress test,  the scans were fine and showed my heart was sound and working normally.  I asked him, then what happened, why did I have the pain and hard heart beats.  He said, sometimes, our bodies kind of misfire, for no apparent reason.  He thought my heart had just misfired and then tried to reestablish the correct rhythm with the hard heartbeats and spent the rest of the day and night trying to reinforce the correct rhythm (which is why it had the occasional hiccup feeling and increased heart beats) and that I did the right thing to come get it checked out.  Now we know that my heart is sound and working perfectly fine and to just ignore it if it happens again and is fairly similar to the first time.  I also asked him why the Dr. was concerned about my stress test, it was because I apparently reached my target heart rate much more quickly than he expected me to.  Well, number 1, I’m way overweight, number 2, I’m way out of condition, I haven’t done any exercise of any kind since I had my hysterectomy, and number 3, I had pushed myself to the limit during the test, I thought that was what you were supposed to do.  So, neither the Dr. nor I were worried about that.  I told the Dr. I know I need to start exercising and lose this excess weight.   He just looked at me and said, “You know what you need to do.” And that was that. 

Then, of course, we had to wait for the hospitalist to do the final discharge and all that and they let me go home around 5:30, with no change in medications, no high blood pressure meds, no cholesterol meds, no diabetes meds, they said all those things were fine.  So I was pretty pleased, but I was so tired, and even now, feel really exhausted.  So, I’m fine, just tired, fat, and out of condition, LOL. 

Once I catch up on all my computer stuff, I'll begin my eye cane reductions, although I suspect they won't get done until next week sometime.   We are having another Clay Play Day tomorrow, but I'm not sure what we're doing yet, so if I don't post again today, I'll have something to write about/show tomorrow.  

Have a great day.  Smiles and hugs to all.