My Heart Attack: When the Flu Ain't the Flu and Life's Plans Go Up the Flue.
Posted: Friday, July 01, 2011
by Jack H. Schick
I was so much looking forward to my vacation at our place in the foothills on the edge of the Mojave. Early June is a wonderful time to visit the desert. It’s not too hot, yet. There are still some flowers in bloom; there is still a lot of green. I worked the holiday weekend and got a couple extra compensation days so I didn’t have to use extra personal time. I was tired from the busy nine days work in a row, and eager to get away for a relaxing respite. But, the best laid schemes of mice and men go often astray.
We drove out to the desert the next afternoon. The weather was beautiful. The house was fine, thought the mouse sticky-pads were full of dead varmints and the ‘yard’ was over grown with weeds. I had a lot of work to do to remove them and meet the county fire prevention requirements. That could wait. We took the neighbors down to Pappy and Harriet’s Pioneertown Palace for the taco special dinner and spent a relaxing first evening winding down.
Our place is in a sparsely developed area about ten miles out of Yucca Valley up in the eastern foothills of the San Bernardino Mountains at about 4,500 feet elevation. It is high desert scenery in a Joshua Trees forest with rugged, rocky saw tooth Mountains on the horizon. With frequent breaks sitting under our shade tree, I spent the next couple days hoeing weeds and trimming bushes. I forced myself to drink a lot of water to ward off the dehydration so commonly suffered by inexperienced desert visitors.
Late one night I woke up not feeling well. When I got up to go to the bathroom I felt light headed and woozy. I made it to the toilet okay, but on the way back to the bedroom I fainted in the hallway. I quickly came to and called for my wife in the other room. She took my pulse and it seemed normal. I assumed I was dehydrated and getting the flu. I went back to bed for some restless sleep accompanied by some fantastic dreams.
The following days I was sick. I figured I’d come down with a bug. I was light headed when I stood up. I had no energy. Any activity made me excessively tired. I just lay around sipping ice water and juice. I was a bit disappointed that I was not able to do some things I’d planned to do while I was there. I guess, like many, I was not paying attention to the signs my body was giving me. At least, I was misinterpreting them. I’d had a heart attack that night. I ignored it, did not respond to it. I assumed I was merely sick.
“How was your vacation?” everyone asked when I got back to work.
“I was sick the whole trip.” I commiserated. “And, I’m still sick.”
I finally went to the doctor about my “flu,” nine days after the fact. After an EKG, she immediately sent me to the emergency room. They put me in the ICU over night, gave me an echo-cardiogram the next morning and quickly transported me to another hospital. Late that evening they finally got me into the cardiac catherization lab and ran the tubes up my arteries to check out my heart.
The findings were not good. I have a completely blocked right coronary artery. They did no ballooning. They installed no stents. There was nothing they could do at that point. They gave me prescriptions. They told me to do no lifting, no driving, no work and no strenuous activities for at least another week. I have an appointment with a cardiologist a week from now, when the prognosis and recovery plan will be revealed. I carry a bottle of Nitrostat in my pocket to be used if I have pain or tightness in my chest.
My energy level is low. I’m depressed and frightened. The feeling I’ve always had, that I’m the same person I was when I was eighteen is quickly fading. The great plans for retirement and future activities have to be re-evaluated. My failure to respond to my ‘event’ is irresponsible. I simply was not a believer. I plodded forward as I always have, immune to the reality of life. Now that reality looms menacingly before me, a dark cloud of uncertainty on the horizon.
We learn by experience. But, sometimes, as the old Pennsylvania Dutch saying goes: “We grow old too soon and smart too late.” I’ll wait out the uncertainty. I’ll do what the experts tell me too do. I feel like the same person, but I’m not. As the realities about my future emerge, I’ll crawl out from under this burden of depression and fear and face a new world. No, it’s not new world, I guess. It’s simply the same old one with a different me looking at it from a new perspective.
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