My first ambulance ride!

In December, I had some periods of my heart racing and getting dizzy. At the time, I had an EKG and cardiac stress test that both came back fine. But my potassium levels were dangerously low so once it returned to normal, everything seemed fine. Until about 6 weeks ago when I started getting dizzy again. When I passed out, I headed to the doctor. Another normal EKG later and I found myself wearing a heart monitor and restricted from driving.

Excuse me, take away a girl's ability to drive to the mall, severely limit her shopping therapy and make her wear electrodes that make her skin itch like crazy... How do they think that's going to help my heart?

After wearing the monitor for 2 1/2 weeks, they called and said they had enough to make a diagnosis but oh by the way, you get to wait 5 days for your doctor to get the report. OK, fine, I can handle that. It must not be that serious if they didn't say head to your cardiologist right now. If it was serious, they would rush the report, right? Oh, no, what if there really is nothing wrong and they say I just need a shrink? Do they need the 5 days to prepare a padded cell? Wait a minute...take a deep breath...calm down...you're stressing yourself out and your heart's not racing now. It's not all in your head. Just relax and wait.

So I go about my daily work, even though I'm having 10 or so episodes a day where I get dizzy, my heart races, I get white as a ghost and 6 people ask me if I'm alright. (BTW- I don't need any more newlywed jokes. Several people, the first of which was my father, have blamed Ben for the symptoms I am having.) I'm sitting in a meeting with 100 of my closest campus employees. It's a exciting meeting, good information, not boring at all when I turn to my friend Lynnettee and say "I think I'm in trouble." She says "I can see that" and we headed to the lobby as she dials 9-1-1. Now for weeks, I haven't been able to wear a dress to work because of the monitor and I was excited to wear one this day. But not once I realized that the very cute paramedics were going to have to take it off to attach a whole bunch of wires to me. Good thing the top was loose enough that I could slip one arm out at a time and then put it back on once they were attached!

So they give me oxygen and nitroglycerin, start an IV and ask me a million questions about what's going on. After receiving another "normal" EKG, they tell me to relax, that I'm not having a heart attack. Then, Justin, the Metro West ambulance paramedic arrives and I get to take my first ambulance ride!


I won't bore you with the details- the nurses were wonderful, I had a chest X-ray, all kinds of lab tests and plenty of drugs (did you know nitro gives you the worst headache? but headache/heart attack- not really a toss-up!!) and the ER doc thinks I had an anxiety attack and should go home and quit wasting his time. He wasn't quite that blunt but he made it very clear he didn't think I needed to be there. Very, very frustrating but I guess they see all kinds of stories and he has to be skeptical.

I slept for most of the next two days while Ben harassed my doctor for test results (she is entitled to a day off occasionally!). My husband was amazing. He took care of me, never leaving my side and holding my hand as we waited for results. Her first words were "you've had too much excitement the last 6 months." Her too??? Is this a conspiracy? As it turns out, I have a benign form of Supraventricular Tachycardia(SVT) which means my heart is misfiring but it is not because of heart disease (thus the normal EKGs). Also it seems, the blood pressure medication she prescribed to control the symptoms is one I took for many years as a migraine prevention. She said that I have probably had this problem for a long time but I controlled it without us knowing.

It's been one week since I started the medication and I'm finally starting to feel better. Thank you to everyone for your prayers. I can't wait to get back to riding our bikes and going for hikes! It won't be long!