Thursday, August 15, 2013

Month 118

Another month. First Quarter. Well, I've survived 1 of the 40 quarters and how.

A new fear has gripped me. Its a matter of heart. Literally. Since April, I've been having discomfort in my chest. Particularly the left side. I got my ECG done and it so happened that I found I have an anomaly. Namely, my T wave is inverted in the third. Well I tell you, the internet is a dangerous place to research symptoms and inferences. My pain wasn't going and some article on the internet was predicting unstable angina and therefore a heat attack within a year. Holy crap! I'm not ready for it yet. I panicked. My pain wasn't getting any better either. It wasn't like it pains only when I work out(which I have stopped for more than a month now). Its there, right from the moment I wake up. It comes and goes as the day goes by.

So I bit the bullet and got a stress test done. As the doctor was putting together the result, I asked him about the T wave inversion. He waived his hand dismissively and said," its a normal deviation, even I have it. Nothing to worry about. I've seen your stress test. Its okay."

That was in May. In July, my stress levels were up on both the job and the home fronts and the pain wasn't getting any better. On a couple of occasions, I had a sharp pain shooting through my chest for about half a second and almost knocking me off. There was getting worse. I had issues with arm positions too. This time I decided to visit a cardiologist. He reviewed the stress test results and my lipid profile. His suggestion, my stress test reports are good and the kind of pain I'm having is not heart related. But, to be on the safer side, he suggests I get echo test done. Also, he recommends moving to statins to control my LDL cholesterol.

I panic again.Anyhow I go and get my echo done. The stress test comes normal. Again. But then there is a finding in my echo. MVP. Its mild, the doctor says. There are no regurgitation, but its there. The rest of the report spells out several parameters and they seem okay. Now I'm worried about this MVP. It does not look good. In the mean time, my wife has spoken to everyone in her family about this. I'm getting calls from everyone and I'm freaking out...

So, what do I do? I've taken a small break and am in Khandala for 2 days enjoying the weather and the view. Its a nice break. But damn! The discomfort in the chest continues... 

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