Thursday, July 17, 2008

Doctor’s, Tea, and Me

Busy, busy, busy … but isn’t that the way summer is?

We were truly blessed to have my sister and her family come down to visit.

My brother in-law deserves a metal! After driving the long journey, he was left to deal with two sisters (me and his wife) and four kiddos. Not only did he take them to the park one day, but on another day he took the kiddos to lunch and then swimming at their hotel while we ladies went to tea. I have a thing for tea and tea accoutrements so I have to show you the set my sister gifted me with:

Isn’t it beautiful!

Of course, since they don’t normally visit every year and they had just come last summer, they purposely timed their visit so that my hubby could accompany me to the doctor while they watched the boys.

So here’s the scoop:

  • There is more than one type of atrial fibrillation and the type that I have is not fatal (that means when I have an episode my heart should not explode). That’s good news! However, if ignored and allowed to continue that status could change.
  • Unfortunately, with all types of atrial fibrillation, my blood can pool in my heart, clot, and cause a stroke.
  • The beta blocker medication I was on is not an option – it didn’t stop the episodes and the side-effects where considerable and life controlling.
  • Ablation is still an option; but, due to obvious risks and a small chance of failure we opted to try a new medication in the calcium blocker category first.
  • Apparently, the hormone prescribed to me, which began this whole ordeal, is capable of “rewiring” your heart electrochemically by burning new pathways. However, if the episodes can be stopped completely for about 6 to 8 months: the older, God ordained pathways can re-immerge as the dominant pathways and negate the surgery.
  • As usual there are a slew of side-effects, so here is a prayer request: that this medication stops all episodes, no side-effects, and that the heart reverts so surgery is mute.

PS – take a gander at the Entrepreneurial Days to the right, I hope to write a little about my experience in 2006 when I’m not so disoriented (side-effect) both the beta and calcium blockers tend to make me a very distractible with the inability to focus, confused, air head (thus not many posts as they are very difficult to compose at this juncture). So, please excuse any grammar, spelling issues, etc.