So i know you guessed it but our current total now put me at 115 pounds down. So exciting to live life this way. Why the heck did I not do it sooner? Well heck if we want to use hindsight why did i get so big in the first place? Well we know that answer.
So a funny thing happened. Funny weird , and yet also funny ha ha. Early Monday morning about 4:40 am i was awakened by a pain in my chest. Yes left sided , directly over my heart. I waited thinking maybe it was some small temporary thing, but no matter what i couldn't make it go away. Nor could I go back to sleep. Then i got a bit anxious and scared. As many of you know my family history, and for those who don't my mother had her first heart attack at a very young age a few years before my current age. That being so well known, I made the decision to go to the emergency room. I awoke my wife, and we sauntered off to the ER.
Now the immediately checked my EKG and started an IV, well first they missed and really hurt me, then called for a nurse who was the most skilled i have had in starting an IV. She also happens to be a friend of my sister Pamela, who worked at South SHore hospital's Emergency room for years.( it is good to know someone!) SO after putting that in my elbow area ( the antecubital space FYI), and drawing blood we awaited test results, well turns out the protocol for this is you get an EKG and blood drawn every three hours , for a total of three times each and they check your heart enzymes, and EKG for changes. Well after three sets were done ( and 8 attempted times for the 3 blood draws) it was decided that i would stay in the observation unit and today would have a Nuclear stress test. Simply put, you run a treadmill while they watch your EKG and take your vital signs, and first they take nuclear imaging pics, similar to a CT scan, but you have radioactive tracer material injected into you so they can trace the blood flow through the vessels in the heart.
After this you walk then run on a treadmill until you hit your target heart rate then they inject you again with more radioactive material, and you run one more minute then they ship you back off to the Nuclear imaging machine that retakes all the pics to show the enhanced blood flow through the heart. Well we did that and the results of all the tests show my heart is completely normal. (YAY!)
Now here is the weird part. While I was in the emergency room, my nurse of course asks my medical history. Well so I mention the Gastric Sleeve surgery and she says " oh i just had gastric bypass surgery in september, and my husband had it 1.5 years ago." So what are the chances I would hit it off like that with the nurse. We talked for a long time each time she came in to check vital signs etc. So that in itself isn't totally weird , I mean hey it happens right? Okay so I am in the exercise stress test area and there is a nursing student watching me get prepared. The nurse there looks at my chart and says oh my sister had the gastric sleeve last year, and the nursing student says her mother had it last year as well. What are the chances that i get nurses with direct family members having had weight loss surgery?
The really weird part is today while in the observation area, the nurse practitioner comes in to start my discharge process and she asks me what hospital I had my surgery done at, and I tell her Saint Elizabeth's and she says "oh yeah i had my gastric bypass there too last year." I literally looked at my wife in amazement. Did they specifically know to give me these caregivers? I was astounded. What a turn of events. Coincidence isn't just a word it seems. Well to make a long story short, I am ok. My heart is normal and they attributed my chest pain to either an inflamed or torn muscle in the rib cage in the heart area, or a cracked rib. Which since me and the wife spent the weekend doing major spring cleaning, getting rid of bags of old clothes and big plastic tubs of books, coupled with a really good gym workout, I evidently overdid it. So thankfully I am ok, and back home.
Now not to change subjects, but there is a company called Maya Kaimal. They make indian foods. They also make a tortilla like chip that is made from rice flour and chickpeas. So it is low in carbs and contains fiber and protein. I love them with some nice pico de gallo salsa. SInce i can only eat a few anyway, they really hit the spot. So i wrote to them and they sent me 9 bags of these chips and a case of various cooking sauces as well as a bottle of their spicy Ketchup, which is awesome.
We tried the butter Masala first , added it to chicken and it was just fantastic. The chicken stayed moist and was very flavorful. We next tried the Jalfrezi Curry which was also great for the same reasons. So if you like Indian foods, these sauces are worth getting.
So thats it for now friends more to come i promise. Thank you all for your support, kind words and constant inspiration. I love you all.
I will leave you with this posts cartoon.
Thanks for posting your blog URL in the Bariatic Pal forum, it really helps reading how others are doing. The encouragement and positivity really help! I'm checking those chips and Indian products out!
ReplyDeleteSo glad you heart is healthy and fine, as a matter of fact I go Monday to the cardiologist for a check to see about the flutter in my chest since Bypass in January. Hoping I'll turn out as well as you did.
If you'd like to visit my WLS blog it's http://mymirrorsreflection.blogspot.com/ I'll be checking back for updates and I still want to go back and read you older posts.
BTW - Love your background!!!
Every day I visit a number of blog sites to see content, however this offers quality based content.
ReplyDeletewayfair.com