I hate starting by reciting my biography, but in this instance it is a bit necessary, because the topic of this blog is the life I've led and the life I'm leading as a Congenital Heart Patient. And in order to understand where I find myself now, I guess it is important to know at least the essentials of where I've been before. So here goes.
I was born in 1970, and my parents were almost immediately told that there was a problem. I mean, they could see that there was a problem, as I was born almost two months early and reportedly could be held in one of my uncle's hands. But the internal problem was the most worrisome - I had been born with almost no separation between the two ventricles of my heart. Maybe someday I'll figure out what that means, and post about it, but for my childhood, it just meant a lot of visits to a pediatric cardiologist in New York City, a standing order that I should sit down in gym class if I got out of breath, and a few surgeries and procedures, when I was two, nine, and seventeen.
Since I turned thirty eight several years ago, I have had to restart those visits to the cardiologist with some unexplained discomfort in my chest. And about a month before I turned forty, my heart decided that it wanted to do something called atrial fibrillation. According to my doctor, the heart procedure I had when I was seventeen often results in atrial fibrillation about the time the patient turns forty, a fact that they didn't know when I first had my surgery (called a Classic Fontan Procedure) so many years ago.
I've had a few recurrences of the atrial fibrillation (a-fib), and finally had a procedure called an ablation, which has helped out for the time being, but right after the ablation I had some funky heartbeats (a.k.a. slow heartbeats), so I went right back to the hospital and had a pacemaker put in. The other bummer was that because of my heart condition, the safest way to put the pacemaker in was to lay it on top of my heart, a procedure which required them to open my chest. Blech.
So now I'm recovering from that procedure, which takes some time, and wondering what is going to happen next. And that is not just paranoia, I've been in the hospital four times in the past three months. My cardiologist, who is regarded as one of the best Adult Congenital Cardiologists in the business, tells me that patients who have had the classic Fontan often have recurrent trouble with a-fib, so we've all got our fingers crossed, but may have to deal with more a-fib at some point.
I won't lie, some days are better than others. And that's what this blog is all about, the good and the bad. While I've been bouncing in and out of hospitals, I've often wondered how my fellow Adult Congenital Heart Defect (ACHD) patients deal with similar circumstances. I'm sure there are others dealing with similar health concerns, and I thought maybe if I started writing, it might eventually help us all.
I was born in 1970, and my parents were almost immediately told that there was a problem. I mean, they could see that there was a problem, as I was born almost two months early and reportedly could be held in one of my uncle's hands. But the internal problem was the most worrisome - I had been born with almost no separation between the two ventricles of my heart. Maybe someday I'll figure out what that means, and post about it, but for my childhood, it just meant a lot of visits to a pediatric cardiologist in New York City, a standing order that I should sit down in gym class if I got out of breath, and a few surgeries and procedures, when I was two, nine, and seventeen.
Since I turned thirty eight several years ago, I have had to restart those visits to the cardiologist with some unexplained discomfort in my chest. And about a month before I turned forty, my heart decided that it wanted to do something called atrial fibrillation. According to my doctor, the heart procedure I had when I was seventeen often results in atrial fibrillation about the time the patient turns forty, a fact that they didn't know when I first had my surgery (called a Classic Fontan Procedure) so many years ago.
I've had a few recurrences of the atrial fibrillation (a-fib), and finally had a procedure called an ablation, which has helped out for the time being, but right after the ablation I had some funky heartbeats (a.k.a. slow heartbeats), so I went right back to the hospital and had a pacemaker put in. The other bummer was that because of my heart condition, the safest way to put the pacemaker in was to lay it on top of my heart, a procedure which required them to open my chest. Blech.
So now I'm recovering from that procedure, which takes some time, and wondering what is going to happen next. And that is not just paranoia, I've been in the hospital four times in the past three months. My cardiologist, who is regarded as one of the best Adult Congenital Cardiologists in the business, tells me that patients who have had the classic Fontan often have recurrent trouble with a-fib, so we've all got our fingers crossed, but may have to deal with more a-fib at some point.
I won't lie, some days are better than others. And that's what this blog is all about, the good and the bad. While I've been bouncing in and out of hospitals, I've often wondered how my fellow Adult Congenital Heart Defect (ACHD) patients deal with similar circumstances. I'm sure there are others dealing with similar health concerns, and I thought maybe if I started writing, it might eventually help us all.
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