The Latest News About My Health

I originally started writing a blog post about my current health situation that was super reflective; all about autumn and the seasons and how things change us.  I even worked in a funny bit about pumpkin spice lattes because, fall.

It's FALL...so we pick apples!

Well, a couple weeks had passed since I'd last worked on it and several things have changed and while I still have lots of pressing opinions/thoughts/feelings on chronic illness, I feel the need to get to the point and share with those of you who are interested what exactly is going on with me.

On the evening of September 3rd, I had what was diagnosed as an acute episode of supra ventricular tachycardia; a rather common form of heart arrhythmia that usually resolves itself pretty quickly by way of a prescription for beta blockers.  That night itself was intensely scary, but the whole situation

Drama queen.

just became increasingly more problematic when it didn't get better.  Every day, I would wake up and think, great, today is the day I will wake up and make it through a whole day without my heart feeling as though it about to pound right out of my chest!  And that just never happened.  I could barely teach two classes during the regular school day and, on occasion, sometimes didn't even make that.  I was often light headed and woozy. And I was oh so very tired.  Not to mention, the beta blockers that should have been regulating things just didn't seem to be working all that well.

I finally had my echo cardiogram and stress test this past Monday.  I went in to my afternoon's worth of appointments with a list of symptoms and questions and data points I had carefully gathered, only to be completely shut down at the doctor's office that day.  All of my tests came back just fine, so obviously, there was nothing wrong with me.  I was told, point blank, any symptoms I was feeling were likely just residual anxiety and I should just take more of my anti-anxiety meds.

Um..what?  I'll save it for another blog post, but let's just say...I know my way around a good anxiety attack and what I had been feeling was definitely not simply anxiety.  I walked out of the doctors' office in tears and I'm not sure I'd ever felt so humiliated or dismissed by medical professionals in my life.  I also had a brand new event monitor.

I refused to shake the idea that something was seriously wrong with me, though.  I was finally able to speak with a tech the following day who did her best to back up what I had been told the day before.  Fast forward to this afternoon and I had been called back into the doctor's office to speak to an actual doctor for the very first time since I'd been in the ER in the beginning of September.


Turns out....I'm not crazy after all and it's more than anxiety.  I have a particular type of tachycardia that will require a catheterized ablation to stabilize, but, once that happens, I should be set.  I meet with the surgeon Monday afternoon and in the meantime,  I'll be doing exciting things like "not driving," and maybe I'll get around to finishing up my more reflective blog post.

Sure, a simple diagnosis, like traditional SVT, would likely have been easier to handle, I'm just thankful to finally have some real information.  And it is an excellent reminder for all of us to truly listen to our bodies, even when a whole lot of other people seem to think they know more about your own body than you do.