January 31st, 2009

Dear Iota of the Blogosphere,

Hello!

It's been a long month --

One of the biggest, right? And it has passed oddly for us, some of the
time marching along in sinus rhythm and some of the time plodding
along to its (my!) own strange beat.

Thank you to all for good wishes, and special thanks to yesterday's
special helpers who arrived by phone and car in the hours before
Sabbath: Mom and Dad, who helped us make bail; Drs. E and M, who
called to check in on me, and lifted much of the weight of the world
off my heavy heart; and Reb A and Chayele and baby MM, who made
delicious soup, baked challah, and delivered it to us in the midst of
preparing for their own family Shabbes. Thank you, thank you, thank
you, many more times than those words can fill these pages.

Note re: bail: we weren't in jail but we were feeling rather locked up
by debt. Yes, insurance pays for hospitalization, but it doesn't pay
for the motel down the block (for the husband and cat), nor for the
gas for the car for the 200 miles each way, nor for the headlight that
burned out. (At least that's what we think the problem is. We hope the
car does not have more significant electrical problems as does its
owner. Monday asap we will make an appointment with the The Car Doctor
to diagnose and repair the The One Eyed Car, hopefully before it calls
attention to itself.)

To whom it may, I'm back in a-fib, and I'm back in bed. I can barely
keep my head up. It occurs to me the cause of that might not be the
fib, but might be the newest med to join my pillbox, Diovan. It's a
cutie: nice shape, nice enough color. It doesn't get stuck en route
down the esophogus.

Every new pill (despite the seriousness of its necessity) gives me a
chuckle. Just think: someone has a JOB (for the pharmaceutical
industry) coming up with a shape, a color, and a name. It's evident to
me that in recent years the Naming Dudes have been hanging out at the
far end of the alphabet. Vioxx, Viagra, Zoloft, Xanax . . . What are
they thinking? My personal prize still goes to Premarin. Yes, please,
tell it like it is: Pregnant Mare Urine. Very nice, Drug Namers!

Also thanks to Maria, Masterful Nurse and Good Friend with whom I had
a long and lovely conversation Thursday night. She was the right
person to call at the right time.

And endless thanks to Steve, who has been doing a great job taking
care of me, and the house, and picking up the slack from my dropped
end of the rope of our universe, while juggling two jobs and taking
two classes.

And our wonderful kitty nurses, surround me with fur love and laying
on of paws . . . .

Speaking of bail: here's an odd syncronicity. The accused meat packing
plant owner 2.5 hours up the road made his bail this week too, and it
was 10 times mine. That's what he had to pay, which is one tenth of
the amount the judge set -- which is to say that amount is another 10
times more. This is apropos of nothing, except multiplying things by
ten (so easy! just add zero!), contextualizing dollar amounts, and
noting odd details. Watch your newpapers for the trial in a few
months. Meanwhile, The Accused is confined to Allamakee County which,
besides having a name that nicely rolls off the tongue, is one of the
lovlier places in Iowa. And, it's approximately halfway between here
and the Mayo Clinic!

What's up here: it was a lovely mild day, but I didn't attempt to
walk. I'm back in bed, and writing by hand, so when you read each one
of these words know that dear Steve put them on to the computer.

What's up medically: recap with hindsight and new news

January 5th early in the morning we checked into St. Mary's, which is
the part of the Mayo Clinic where heart stuff happens. It's also the
original hospital that some Sisters (as in nuns) built for the Dad of
the Brothers Mayo. Its atmosphere is cloistered; statues are Catholic.
(This is in marked contrast to Mayo's downtown campus where you can
find Miro and a giant 13 part Dale Chihuly and much more!)

I had a room at the end of the hall, a nice quiet courtyard facing
room as far from the nursing station as I could get, in the Francis
quadrant of the hospital. In fact, my room was a glance away from the
room I was in for my 2 previous visits, a street side room in the
Joseph wing, at a busy corridor intersection where doctors gathered to
confer and horizontal and wheel chaired patients rolled by frequently
en route to testing areas down another hall. In between my '05 and '09
rooms were elevators, with a statue of St. Francis and birds and small
mammals facing them. In 2005 we had photographed Steve and Luna with
St. F and the animals and we had said goodnight there most evenings so
it was good to see those old friends.

After check ins and tests I was taken away to a prep room and then a
procedure room, and Steve and Luna went off to the Ray-Mar Motel.
After a wait with a nice view (the back of the towers at the 2nd
Street entrance; me well oriented and facing due north; the sky blue)
I can't tell you much about what happened except to say I was OUT for
more hours than I had been since my tonsillectomy (52 years ago? when
they used ether and I was a noncompliant little girl whose last words
pre-procedure were: I'm not going to breathe that stuff, I'm going to
hold my breath forever . . . deep inhale . . . and wake in bed with
blood on the pillow and offerings of vanilla ice cream . . . ).

The drug I was given was fentanyl, which Wikipedia says is 80 times
stronger than opium. I felt no pain. My heart was entered via
catheters through my veins; anticipated work was done (except some
work on my right atrium wasn't expected). Dr. B assured me that while
I was under the team had done everything they could to make me go into
a-fib and I remained in sinus rhythm. Thus, a success.

I was rolled back to my room, reunited with Steve, and I had to lie
excruciatingly still for hours. I was hooked up to tubes, including IV
fentanyl. You don't want all the details, do you? I'm proudest of what
I said when I regained consciousness in the procedure room, just three
distilled requests:

Where's Steve?

Where's my cat?

Can I have some water?

More on the water later, but suffice it to say the procedure was
presumed to be a success.

The next day (Tuesday 6 Jan.) I sat in a chair, had lunch, and was on
the phone when I felt suddenly exhausted and wanted to lie down . . .
and that was the moment that I went back into a-fib. 11:57 a.m.
Discussion: what meds. Tikosyn suggested then dismissed: my fears were
not unfounded. What it does to QT intervals is exactly what we don't
want for mine. (If you are not a doctor you probably don't understand
this. Rest assured, neither do I, but one day I will read that book
about how to read and EKG . . . ) Decision: a return to flecanide, my
previous drug, an old friend abandoned a month prior.

Hindsight awareness: why was I only given 2 doses of flecanide before
my cardioversion the next day? If I had been "loaded" on at least five
doses, as I was in 05, according to protocol, would I be in sinus
rhythm now? I want to flip the calendar pages back to 1-7-09 and spend
the day resting in my hospital room and have 3 doses of flecanide, and
have my cardioversion the next day, and rest all that Thursday, and be
monitored, and ingest lasix to take off the 7 pounds of water that
were dripped into me during the Monday procedure, and move to the Ray
Mar Friday.....

As it was there was a whole lot of Hurry Up going on. In hindsight my
faith in Mayo drops. I had a cardioversion Wednesday morning (1-7-9)
and the room in which it was done spun around me when I came to. It
seemed like I was allowed to pause a very short time befoe I was
rolled into a recovery area...and the world spun a few minutes there
and then I was wheeled back to my room. I had to ask the person who
pushed me to Please Stop A Minute and Go Slower Please because of all
the whirling. Back in room it seemed like a team of cheerleaders were
jumping up and down saying Eat! Eat!Eat because we have to get that
flecanide in you and we know it makes you sick on empty. I said ya
gotta give me 20 minutes Please. Then I ate then I felt puke-ey but I
didn't . Then I had a Headache with a capital H and the doc said
That's no reason to stay in the hospital and I said wanna make a deal,
give me rx to make the headache go away and I'm outta here....deal
accomplished.

Mayo has a good exit protocol: don't go too far after discharge just in case.

We walked the one block to Ray Mar. I got an hour of tv comedy
Wednesday and Thursday, and lots of Luna love. I was back as an
outpatient for low molecular weight heparin infusions every 12 hours
through Sunday morning; I was back for a chest x ray for a cough,
caused by fluid sitting on my lung. I was prescribed 2 lasix and they
wiped me out but the 7 pounds went away. Cindy Nancy Daniel and his
grandpa came to visit Thursday; we visited C+N Saturday after the
infusion. Friday night was mild. We had a nice time at the synagog,
and then walked

.......CONTINUED IN PART 2: BEGIN HERE