My Own Emergency

I was reviewing my journal postings and came across this one about my mother-in-law having a heart attack last year. Little did I know when I was writing that post that I would have my own emergency a mere 2 or 3 weeks later. I think I've written about it at my Knitting blog, but I'll repeat it here very briefly. It will be short because to be honest, it still freaks me out a little bit.

One evening toward the end of September I was lying on the sofa getting my nightly foot rub from my husband. He used to do this because it was very relaxing and helped me unwind so I could go to sleep. This particular night I noticed my heart was sort of fluttering. I was used to it because I have a heart murmur and have had palpitations or flutters off and on for years. Ever since I was diagnosed with a heart murmur. Anyway, this felt different. I felt like my heart was fluttering and quivering. And it wouldn't stop doing that. Before, it had always fluttered a little and then stopped. It kept doing it for about 30 minutes. We decided it wasn't going to stop fluttering on its own, so we decided to go to the ER and find out what was going on.

It turns out I was having atrial fibrillation. They gave me something in my IV that regulated my heartbeat back to normal, but they decided I should be admitted for observation. Once they regulated everything, I was fine, but they wanted to keep me for tests. I felt much better the whole time I was in the hospital. I had about 3 doctors come in and talk to me about it. They both said it was a common occurrence, but no one seemed to be able to tell me what causes it. Apparently, none of them knows, but I did some research and learned that it's linked to high blood pressure. They both told me that the concern with this happening is that when your heart just quivers it isn't pumping blood like it should and that it can pool and move to another part of your body and cause a blood clot or a stroke. They said most people go on Coumadin to help keep their blood thinned in case of another occurence. Niether of the doctors on call felt that I needed Coumadin. so, then my regular cardiologist comes in and says now I have to go on Coumadin. I talked him out of that and he agreed to let me take a 325 mg aspirin a day to keep my blood thinned, but that if I have another episode like I had that night that I would have to go on Coumadin. Oh, also one of the other doctors said it would probably happen again. Great.

After going home from the hospital I felt really, really good for about 3 months. Then in January I started having palpitations again, or flutters. But, they don't feel like they did that night. I was concerned about them, so I called my regular doctor. He said he would change my blood pressure from a calcium channel blocker to a beta blocker. He said it would help my bp go down and help the flutters. He said the only other thing they could do was a surgical procedure called ablation and he said that was pretty involved. I've researched all the medical procedures and sometimes the ablation doesnt work, but there are other procedures that do work and in fact, cure it completely. The new medicine has helped the heart flutters and seems to be keeping my bp under control. I still have the flutters, but they are not as intense and not as often, thank God.

After all this, I'm still really focused on losing this excess weight. All of the doctors told me that weight loss would help everything ... the high blood pressure would go down and it would help the flutters. So, that's where my focus is right now. I've actually lost about 13 pounds since I first started my new eating lifestyle, so I'm really, really encouraged about that. I feel better, my clothes are looser and it's just wonderful all around. I still have about 30 to 40 pounds to lose to get to where I need to be, but it will happen in time. I hope to lose most of it by the end of this year. I'll do whatever it takes to help myself get better and hopefully avoid having to have a surgery. But, if I have to have surgery, then I'll do that too if it means living a normal life.