Have you ever felt like something was off about you, but you could not put your finger on it? Well welcome to my story! For more than six months, I wasn’t feeling like myself but could not put my finger on the problem. I went to work, but on most days, I came home and went directly to sleep. This wasn’t me at all. I kept making excuses. I had not gained my energy back since “Covid”. I was just tired from working. It’s just the symptoms of perimenopause. It’s the fibroids. Well, these things would make a girl tired! LOL
Fast forward. It is time for my annual physical. I got to my primary care physician who questions me whether there is anything different going on with me. I respond other than being tired all of the time, no. He says well this place (our job) will do it to you lol. But before I tell you stop being lazy and go workout, let’s get some bloodwork and run a stress test just to be sure.
The time has come for my stress test. I make sure to get the first available appointment and I do not go to work or answer my phone before my test. They wired me up and I proceeded to get on the treadmill and walk. The Nurse keeps questioning am I ok, and I keep responding with a polite yes. Eventually the last time she asks, I became annoyed and rudely ask is there a problem. She responded by asking me to remove myself from the treadmill. Everything next happened so quickly, I felt like I was swept up in the eye of a tornado.
My heart rate was through the roof, and although I was not feeling it, it was registering that way on every machine. Next came another heart monitor (I had a few in previous months), and a nuclear stress test. The monitor and the nuclear stress test mirrored the results of the first test. Two days later I was meeting with the cardiologist. He comes in and immediately starts talking. He tells me that he has scheduled me for a cardiac catheterization because he is showing a blockage. Now I don’t care how long I have worked in healthcare, when we talk about matters of the heart it becomes scary. I’m thinking to myself, I don’t eat bad, I’ve exercised until recently, why me. Straight from the cardiologist, I am sent to the lab to have preadmission bloodwork and the to imaging to have a chest x-ray. Are you keeping up??? Because by now even my head was spinning. All of this was done on a Friday. That Wednesday, I report to the hospital for my catheterization. Now for those of you that do not know what this is, stick a wire through either your wrist or your groin area to your heart to check for blockage and possibly place a stent to open the blockage. Thank God they were able to go through my wrist! O by the way, you are sedated, not sleep, so you are aware of everything that is happening.
As I am lying on the procedure table, the cardiologist questions whether I had a normal childhood. I ask if that was a trick question. He then asks me if I was active as a child. My response was I was very active up until covid. He responds, you do not have a blockage, you have a coronary anomaly (birth defect). Thank my Father in Heaven, I did not need a stent. I was required to stay in the hospital only because they needed to find the right combination of medication to keep my heart rate stable. Once released, more testing followed as they needed to find out what the anomaly was. Pictures of my heart were taken. I had to see an electrophysiologist to make sure my heart was “wired” correctly. So, the next few months were filled with appointments.
The conclusion! The right side of my heart never fully developed. That in turn was causing my left side to work overtime. Most would ask how this went undetected for so long. Well, when we are born, unless we are born prematurely and must stay in NICU, they do not do an extensive exam on us. As we get older, unless we present with symptoms, there is no reason for us to be checked out. I never presented with any symptoms, so I had no reason to be checked out. We still do not know the reason my heart decided to alert me now, but we are extremely happy it did. My doctor’s concern was that I could have been anywhere and just expired and no one would have known why. I am medicated now and going about my normal activities. My fight now is to educate. We must start with our youth and have them completely checked out. Our young athletes are going down at early ages because of this same reason and they are ruling it cardiac arrest. For yourself, for your children, for your family, please get your heart checked out. Remember our heart does more than love!
PS: My coworkers and friends had plenty of jokes that kept me going. I am an avid Grinch fan. So, the best joke was, how can something be broken (your heart), that you don’t have lol. Or now we know why you love the Grinch. 😊
Urana Lawrey
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