First Post and Background

Admittedly this is my first attempt at blogging. I don't lack for opinions, or something to say, I just don't think its worth publishing. If I say something worthwhile, let me know...

I want to share my experiences with Open Heart Surgery. (I will refer to it as OHS to decrease the drama). Please ask any questions or let me know what you think.

First, I don't have any known heart disease in my family. We prefer cancer. Both are scary but I got the bad ticker, which I am willing to settle for...

Over the years I have found it harder and harder to aerobically exercise. As my 40 something weight increased, my fitness decreased. That along with high cholesterol got my doctor on the aerobic fitness prescription bandwagon. I knew she was right, but I complained a lot about shortness of breath, feeling ill, and having a hard time even getting in 20 minutes a day. And no, I didn't sleep better, or lose weight of have more energy (liars).

After another appointment, I declared the exercise prescription a bad idea. My doctor, being smarter than me and all, decided to send me to a Cardiologist to prove nothing was actually wrong with me.

Of course, that's when we found out that there was something wrong with my heart (and my doctor).

I had an Aortic Insufficiency. A leaky valve. A murmur... in descending order of scariness. My first cardiologist couldn't have been more excited, he had some pretty swanky offices, great looking "assistants" and he loved the idea of another "long term patient". He made me feel totally dependent on strict regimens, pills, regular stress tests etc. Oh, ya, I needed to not lift weights and go easy on the exercise.

I changed Cardiologists.

My next one had just the opposite point of view. "Lots of people have leaky valves and function with them that way every day, including Stars hockey players". He said I should just quit worrying about it and keep an eye on my cholesterol. He would keep an eye on the leakage and maybe someday we would replace the valve.

I was determined to exercise so I started biking with a pulse meter. I trained four times a week for eight months determined to "just not worry about it". I was passed by every geriatric, overweight woman biker on the planet, no matter how hard I worked. My arms and legs would go numb and I would get slower and slower trying to keep my heart rate below 150.

My cardiologist said that everything was fine, tests look the same so its not progressing, and my heart seems to functioning fine.

Then I had a heart attack. It was a big one for me. 911, emergency room, scared my wife and niece big time. However, for my doctor, it was a little one. In fact it was so little it didn't show up on an EKG and the only way they confirmed it was a heart attack was because I had an increased enzyme specific to heart muscle stress/damage. (Troponen).

We ran lots of tests, spent three days in the hospital and basically got "dont worry about it, the heart's fine, there's no blockage, we have no idea why you had a heart attack". My cardiologists previously reassuring casualness was now very disconcerting. I went through all of the emotional stress, feeling vulnerable and anticipating something worse. A few months later I had another one. Just like the first one, except I didn't go to the hospital, I stayed home.

Then I found a new Cardiologist.

Actually I started by saying I wanted a second opinion. I of course hear everyone recommending a second opinion but I want to state clearly, that's a lot harder to do than say. My initial doctor's staff didn't want to give up records, didn't do what they said they were going to do etc. My second opinion doctor had patients of his own to worry about etc. I did however like his demeanor and I trusted those that recommended him, we started down the current path, together.