heart arrhythmia

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Patient, Heal Thyself: I should get an honorary M.D.

Tallulah Pacehead

I’ve not been functioning up to par.  As most of you, who have followed my blog, know I’ve been having “heart pacemaker issues”.  I’ve sparingly shared the other “happenings” to only a few people because they seemed too bizarre, even for me!  Here’s the list:

  1. After adjusting Tallulah Pacehead, my pacemaker, at least 6 times my light headedness and chest pain kept getting worse.
  2. Adding insult to injury I couldn’t stay awake!!!!!!!!  It was waaaaaaaaaaaay beyond just being tired.  If I sat down and blinked I’d fall asleep, stopping at a stop signal I had to fight to stay awake. I was afraid to drive.  I’d fall asleep for a total of about 8 hours a day (not including 7-8 hours a night)!  The good news is I wasn’t depressed and did intermittently wake up . .. before I fell back asleep . . .
  3. And lastly, I was eating OBSESSIVELY, COMPULSIVELY, non-stop, uncontrolled addictive eating.  I know addiction when I see one but this was the first time I knew it when I BE one.
My fibro doctor, who is wonderful, said I had all the symptoms of narcolepsy. (I always pictured narcolepsy as falling forward or down without warning into a deep sleep, not drifting off)
My cardiologist suggested an angiogram, my internist suggested a c-pap machine and Lindora Weight Control. None of those seemed to be the answer to me as ALL my cardio tests were negative and I’d already gone to Weight Watchers and tried c-pap years ago when I was just exhausted all the time, not falling asleep uncontrollably.
I was so desperate last weekend I started Googling everything I could think of and I do mean everything.  I found the causes:
  • The same blood pressure meds I was now on put me in the hospital in 2009 with a dangerous heart arrhythmia.
  • The medication Mirapex (dopamine enhancer), I’ve been taking for fibro (that literally gave me my life back) can cause NARCOLEPSY and COMPULSIVE ADDICTION to Gambling, Sex or Eating.
Dr. Judith stopped the medications and I’m getting better!!!!!!!!

The only downside is that the morning after I can no longer say

 I was asleep and don’t remember the gambling, sex or food.  

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Pacing My Pacemaker, Tallulah Pacehead – (winter)

Tallulah Pacehead, my pacemaker

Tallulah keeps working overtime and I feel her like a leaden pain in my chest, short of breath and exhausted.

I’ve been back to the cardiologist to have Tallulah simmer down a bit and not bump up my heart beat when it’s not necessary, like dusting or emptying the dishwasher . . . (hmmmm, maybe I shouldn’t be doing strenuous things around the house . . . )

Whatever they did with her computer made it worse so I was back to the cardiologist two days later.   After talking at length to The Physician’s assistant, she went out,  came back  and said the doctor didn’t know what to do next.  (He’s an expert in the area of electrophysiology . . .)

I jokingly replied,  “Tell him to get in here and cure me”.  No sooner were the words out of my mouth and she had left the room I felt the rush of tears.  Tears that seemed to come from nowhere.  I struggled to regain my composure. (In the past I’ve cried in front of too many doctors who dismissed my feelings or leave because they were uncomfortable)

I was, obviously, feeling much more vulnerable than I had been consciously aware of.

With fibromyalgia I know there is always that possibility of feeling better the next day, always the possibility of science coming out with more information and better medications and I know it’s not life threatening.

My heart, as I age, becomes more and more dependent on the pacemaker, on something foreign implanted in my body.  They are the same tears I had in my early days of fibromyalgia when no one knew what it was or what to do about it and doctors were just stabbing in the dark.  I feel like I’m being stabbed again.

Haiku

Mechanical beats

Winter of my discontent

Heart felt discomfort

If you want to read more about Tallulah and see her pictures cut’n’paste  Pacemaker, Tallulah Pacehead in the search block at top of blog

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3 EXCELLENT Reasons not to Exercise

My husband is always after me to exercise. In Southern California it’s difficult to use weather as an excuse so I have to use CreativitytotheMAX

1.  Fibromyalgia Brain Fog:

  • “What!? It’s midnight already!? I was just about ready to go for my walk”;
  • “Are you sure? I could swear I exercised today”;
  • “I couldn’t walk today. I locked myself in.”;
  • “What do you mean the doctor stressed exercise?! I could swear she told me not to stress over exercise.”

It’s difficult to keep up with Brain Fog excuses because I forget them.  So I moved on to bigger and better reasons.  My body is always cooperating.

Tallulah PaceHead, my pacemaker

2.  Heart Problems

When I began to get light-headed on my walks and it wasn’t  the heat, lack of food or dehydration. It was my heart arrhythmia. NOW I really had a good reason not to exercise.

It was heart arrhythmia that led to my getting Tullulah, My pacemaker.
The cardiologist said “Absolutely exercise is fine now.

(in case you missed my heart arrhythmia “story” here are the 3 main posts)

Want the ENTIRE saga, including all the PIN-UP pictures of Tallulah?
Type in PACEMAKER at the top of the blog in the SEARCH box!

3.  Foot Problems

My body, bless its little heart (pun intended) continues to cooperate.  These last few months my foot has REALLY hurt.  The doctor says it’s joint inflamation leading to nerve entrapment.
NOW THIS IS AN EXCUSE if I ever had one.  I limped everywhere, grimacing wildly so my husband could make NO mistake that it was too painful to exercise.
He bought me a folding recumbent bike.

Come to think about it, I actually get a lot of exercise running out of reasons.