One Flew Under The Cuckoo's Nest

The Good:
I'm home, doing well, and the prognosis is excellent.

The Bad:
Last Thursday, I finally got around to joining the family club by having my very own heart attack. Yay me! (Oops. Wait a minute.....)

The Background:
Last Wednesday evening, I was sitting around watching TV and felt an odd pain in my chest. It wasn't terrible, but not being one to take chances, I took an aspirin instead. Then I stretched out on the futon to watch some more TV. The pain went away in about 10 minutes, and I made a mental note to contact the VA to get checked out.

Thursday morning, I got up as usual, strapped on my leg weights (5 lbs each) and walked two miles over to the Rec Center to use their computers and check my e-mail, etc., etc., etc.. When I got done, I walked back home, arriving there a little short of breath around 1:30. I took my leg weights, shoes and shirt off and toweled off, as it was ~75 outside and I had worked up a bit of a sweat. Then I stretched out on the futon to rest a bit before taking a shower. Along about 3:30, I felt a really bad pain in my chest, so I took another aspirin and waited for the pain to go away. After 10 minutes, it didn't go away, so I called 911. Shortly after that the ambulance arrived and took me to the hospital, where they discovered a 95% blockage in one coronary artery. They also found that my hannenframis was pernning on the derialtor of my phranistan. (OK, I made that last part up.) Then the real fun started.

There was a guy there from RotoRooter and he ran something up my femoral artery to ream out the blockage, then they cut a piece off a soda straw and left that in there to keep the artery from collapsing. (That part was kind of fuzzy; I had a lot of morphine in me at the time). This was accompanied by the usual panoply of drugs with unpronounceable names. They kept me in the CCU overnight, then transferred me down to a regular room on Friday. It's Sunday evening as I write this and I've been home since about 2 this afternoon. I'm still a bit tired (due to lack of sleep, basically), but I spent a good part of Saturday and Sunday walking the halls and harassing the nurses. Maybe that's why they got me out.

I'm still catching up on my sleep. It wouldn't've been so bad if they hadn't been waking me up every 4 hours to check my vitals. Nurse Vampira didn't help, either, what with all that blood she took out of me. I'm seriously thinking of contacting the Red Cross for a refill. At least Night Nurse Susan let me sleep straight thru Saturday night without the usual vitals check, but she wouldn't sing me the Soft Kitty Song, so I still didn't sleep all that great.

Around the end of March, I'll be seeing the heart doctor again for another check-up. About that time, I should be allowed to start working out again, but it won't be 150 push-ups and 150 sit-ups and isometrics every day. Leastwise, not for a while.

My phone minutes are extremely limited, but I can check my e-mail a couple of times a week, so I'll be keeping in touch that way. And sending out updates as needed.

Meanwhile.... hey, it takes more than a lousy heart attack to slow me down.