Fixing My Heart Condition

Before I talk about my heart condition, I would like to clarify something about my last post.

I had a few people mention that it was hard to figure out, and understand it.

I was trying to be discreet, but my point was,

that I have tried so hard to let cancer make me a better person.

I thought there for a while that I was going to be better. Well, ok, I will be totally honest, it has made me a better person. I just wanted it so badly to be permanent, and MAJOR, so that I would be able to put my "out of control" self behind me forever!!

I have had moments of being "out of control" since I was about 2 yrs old.

I have enough energy to REALLY get in a rage if I let myself. It is a challenge to keep it in check, but I had been steadily, since becoming an adult, getting better. Since cancer and all that went with it, I have not had a meltdown with anger at all. I wanted it to stay that way, thus after my episode, I felt horrible.

I was very disappointed in myself that I got upset and lost control of my emotions.

My point? if I will just "REMEMBER" all of my blessings, especially my Savior that already took my "outbursts" upon him, then I can stay more calm, and let more things roll off my back.

I was telling myself, as well as all of you, that REMEMBERING is hard to do, but crucial to our emotional , well my emotional, well-being!

BTW, the person I had the falling out with was a family member, and the person that I felt like "threw me under the bus" was also a family member, just in case your mind was imagining otherwise.

NOW,

I thought I would have a "little" heart procedure to help my heart stop racing (at 200 beats a minute) but it ended up to be slightly more than a "little".

25 years ago, I had my first episode of tachycardia. The Dr. assured me that it was not serious, and all I needed to do was tighten up and do some vaso-constriction, like coughing or sneezing, or grunting, and it would stop.

Well, it worked. It stopped. Then it happened again, about 6 mos. later. For the next few years, it only happened a few times. It was no big deal, maybe 3 or 4 times a year, and each time I could get it stopped after only a minute or two of racing.

I figured it was my "racing" personality.

(The doctors say that has nothing to do with it, but do you buy that?)
After many years, it happened a little bit more often, maybe 4 or 5 times a year. A couple of times, it wouldn't stop with the vaso-constriction and I had to lie flat on the floor, and that seemed to work after about 3 or 4 minutes.

There was no rhyme or reason to WHAT would make it start. Sitting still sometimes would trigger it, Eating a LOT of food sometimes triggered it. Bending over often triggered it.

After chemotherapy, it was much different. Now it was happening several times A WEEK! I couldn't get it stopped when it did happen. One day it happened 7 times!! One time it happened at a lecture I was listening to and I had to go out in the lobby and lay on the floor.

The amount of time was increasing to 10 -15 minutes each time, aaaaaahhhhhhh.

More recently, I was sitting in the temple and after 15-20 minutes of it happening, I was starting to get a head ache, and feeling nauseous. I had to leave the temple session and lay on the floor out in the hall, while everyone in the room waited for me. Embarrassing.!!
I knew it was time to do something. I LOVE to get anesthesia anyway, cuz I come out feeling SOO SOO GOOD!! Eric caught these pictures on his phone after surgery, and I was being quite silly, he said. I know I do feel good, and relaxed, and I love everybody, and that includes all the employees at the hospital!! I said lots of funny stuff. ( they tell me)

The Heart Doctor told me that he could do a procedure called "Ablation", where they could go in to my heart with instruments, going through the femoral veins, and find the electrical "short", and just fix it with radio-frequency waves, or something like that.

He made it sound like no big deal. Going into my heart sounded like a big deal, but I was SICK AND TIRED of laying on the floor everywhere I went. Laying on a public bathroom floor next to cockroaches really set me off, and made me decide to have the surgery, this was ridiculous.

After wearing a monitor for 2 weeks, they discovered the exact problem, and said I could take medication, or have the surgery. Since I have no patience, and love anesthesia, I said, "LET"S FIX IT NOW"

So we did.

When I woke up 4 hours later, I kinda freaked out when I felt this big bandaid on my neck and found out they also went through my "JUGULAR" vein to make a "triangle" in my heart to fix it. I guess they gave me meds to make my heart "race" while I was on the table, then he zapped some places that were misbehaving, and then gave the meds again, and my heart didn't race,

"voila", I was fixed!!!

I think I was in surgery about 2 hours and in recovery about an hour. The tough part was that they made me keep "still" for 7 more hours.

I guess the jugular vein needs to start to heal before you get up and run around, which you all know I would do!! :)

The only after effect I had was a headache if I bent over for the next 3 days, so I didn't bend over, and then there was a LARGE bruise on my neck that I had to explain to everyone.

I thought it was funny if I said, "well, I just talk too much, and Dale had finally had it", but pretty much everyone thought that wasn't funny. Too much abuse now days to be kidding around about it. I thought a "hicky" was a good excuse, although that story made me look like I had been.............you know................a little ...................promiscuous, and I didn't like that.

Most everyone thought I had been in a car accident and the seat belt was across my neck. That was the most believable story.

I am happy to say that I am "FIXED" now.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if Everything was that easy??

Actually, isn't is AMAZING what they can do now days to fix people up. I think we have wonderful health care, and I am a little afraid of what the medical world will be like 10 yrs from now, but for today, I am grateful................ so very grateful.................. for smart doctors and health insurance!! They have literally saved my life, more than once.

Oh BTW, since having my heart fixed,

I think I am getting more blood flow to my brain, and I am smarter..............

.tee hee...........................I haven't had any more meltdowns,

or outbursts of anger.............................

so see, I really am FIXED!!!!!