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Chris is home from the hospital and feeling better!

February 8, 2009 by Tricia

It feels like forever since I last made a post in this or any of my other blogs! In fact I think this is the longest absence I’ve had on this blog!

Well if you read the last post you’ll know why! Chris was admitted to the hospital with chest pains or rather a strong pressure feeling in his left chest and dizziness last Friday and he was in the hospital until early Monday evening. He had to wait until Monday before they could do the angiogram to make sure that his coronary arteries were clear (they were!), and then he was discharged on Monday evening to recover at home from the angiogram. He was also sent home with a prescription for cholesterol lowering medication (Crestor) since his good and bad cholesterol was sky high and his triglycerides almost non-existent.

So at this point he’s fine. They couldn’t find anything wrong with his heart, but he still has those symptoms (not now, but every now and then) and a permanently changed electrocardiogram reading that makes it look like he has that rare heart arrhythmia called Brugada.

We have to set up some out patient tests – like a 48 hour Holter monitor (like a 2 day constant ECG) and a stress test as well as followups with two doctors. Otherwise he’s all recovered from the angiogram and the needle in his groin and he’ll be going back to work on Tuesday.

One neat thing that happened or that might have happened this weekend … apparently there’s a big cardiology conference here in Toronto this weekend and one of the two doctors that discovered the rare heart arrhythmia, Brugada, that Chris might have (but tests can’t prove) are apparently attending the conference. So the cardiologist that first saw Chris on Friday when he was admitted asked Chris if he could discuss Chris’ case with Dr. Brugada himself at the conference. I presume he’ll also be taking Chris’ ecg as that is the biggest indicator that Chris might have this rare arrhythmia. Isn’t that cool? The discoverer of Chris possible heart problem might look at Chris’ case?

So I guess we’ll know sometime early this week what Dr. Brugada thinks of Chris’ ecg and symptoms. If he does think that Chris might have Brugada then Chris will have to have a pacemaker defibrillator installed which will shock him and get his heart going again if it suddenly stops due to this rare arrhythmia. Not a great thing, but I’d rather Chris have something that could save his life than living in the unknown and possibly losing him suddenly. That’s stressful!

As for me … well, Chris’ illness took a toll on my health as well. The hospital’s close by and within walking distance so I was trekking back and forth for four days bringing Chris things like my Laptop, dvds to watch on the computer, his big heavy pillow from our bed, clothes, toiletries, reading materials etc … and well of course my Crohn’s got worse, and so did my back. My back’s been bad for most of the last year and walking a block or two sets off spasms. I seriously think my vitamin D deficiency has weakened my bones and that’s why my back is getting worse and worse – the top of my left thigh – to below my knee is now numb (since Monday or so) as well, so something is pinching a nerve.

Plus I seem to have hurt my wrist last week – how I don’t know – maybe playing with the dog, so my wrist has been aching enough for the last week and a half that I’ve even wondered if it was broken! Hopefully it’s just a muscle or tendon that’s been pulled, but if this keeps up I’ll get it checked out this week -as well as getting a back xray!

So basically, Chris came home from the hospital on Monday evening feeling pretty good – well his groin and right leg hurt a lot due to the angiogram, but it’s better now … and I came home a mess! I was exhausted, had abdominal pains from the Crohns plus fevers, back pain and wrist pain … you name it. It took until about yesterday for me to start feeling somewhat better. That’s the main reason I haven’t written all week! Just feeling too crappy, plus the wrist makes it harder to type.

Ha, between Chris and I we’re a sad tale. LOL God forbid we start looking for life insurance quotes or anything like that. I’m sure the companies would just laugh at us right now.

I certainly hope that you have all had a better week than Chris and I have. I also hope that those of you who are getting some unseasonably warm weather (north east) are enjoying watching the snow melt away. We certainly are … although Midnight, our Lab, who likes to pee in snow banks is finding it strange.

Speaking of Midnight – the stress of the last week took a toll on her too. Between having three people she’s not used to in the house (the in-laws and Chris’ aunt) and the excitement that goes along with that, being in her crate for longer than normal while I was away visiting Chris in the hospital and of course missing Chris it threw her off. By Sunday she was barely eating her food (and she’s a Lab – they live to eat!). It took her until Thursday or so to start eating mostly normally again. She’s still being a little picky, but she’s pretty much back to normal. I guess she didn’t like all the changes and stress anymore than I did. I’m glad she’s pretty much acting like her old self as I was beginning to wonder is she too might be sick.

Also, thanks to everyone who left kind messages in my last post wishing Chris well. We really appreciated each and every comment. Thank you.

Chris is in the Acute Cardiac Care ward at our hospital

January 31, 2009 by Tricia

It’s been a long and stressful day … or rather yesterday was since today is just starting.

Yesterday at about 3 pm my husband called me from work. He was in Emerg and he told me that he’d just been admitted to the hospital. He then put the cardiologist on the phone to talk with me. There’s nothing like hearing what’s going on straight from the doctor!

Chris apparently had chest pain while at work. He’s an attendant in the OR Day Surgery Recovery room area of our hospital. He’d just transferred a patient to a room and suddenly had chest pain and felt dizzy. The ward clerk for the area he was in saw him and went “Oh no, not again Chris!” … you see, this has happened before.

Back in 2004, only two months after my sister had had thyroid surgery and ended up in a coma after the drainage tube was removed from her neck (she’d been bleeding into her neck and it was slowly cutting off her oxygen supply to her brain), my husband felt strange at work and he made his way to the ER triage desk, only to pass out right at the nurses feet. At the time we thought that the stress of dealing with my sisters condition might have caused Chris’ problems.

He’d had some kind of heart arrhythmia that caused him to pass out and also ended up causing permanent changes on his ECG (electrocardiogram). After several tests the cardiologists thought that he might have a rare heart arrhythmia called Brugada. So they decided to send him to one of our Toronto Hospitals that specialize in heart care – St. Mikes. After a week in St. Mikes, and several tests including an EP (test to stop the heart electrically and chemically to pinpoint arrhythmia’s) they decided that he didn’t have Brugada, even though his ecg, symptoms and most other test results pointed to it.

Over a six month period he gradually got better, but every now and then he’d have weird chest pains, dizziness and sometimes weird tingling in his arms or legs. Over the last month he’s complained a few times of chest pains and I guess I was starting to be on guard for something like this to happened again … so I guess I wasn’t all that shocked when I got the call yesterday afternoon.

So back to that phone call. The doctor told me about Chris’ symptoms, stated that his ECG still looked like Brugada and that he wanted to admit him to the Acute Coronary Care ward for observations. He also told me that Chris’ cholesterol and triglycerides were sky high and that they had been back in 2004 and 2007 and when he had another incident … why our family doc didn’t pick up on this is a good question! So he also wants to do an angiocath on Monday. I’m presuming this is because of the high cholesterol and triglycerides. He probably wants to make sure that Chris doesn’t have any blocked Coronary arteries.

His official admission diagnosis is Brugada so I guess they really are still going with that. Chris said they called it Brugada class two .. I’ll have to find out what that means exactly.

Chris is feeling fine now. Thank God!

He doesn’t really want to be in the hospital at all, but if we can figure out what keeps causing the chest pain and find out once and for all if he really does have Brugada that would be helpful! We’d rather know what we’re dealing with. If he does have Brugada they’ll put in a defibrillator pacemaker so if his heart stops it can give him a shock and hopefully get it going again. It will also be good to find out if his arteries are clean or clogged up and fix them up too if necessary as that could help prevent a heart attack!

Now you remember that old saying “Bad things come in Threes“? Well they do, they certainly do!

1. Earlier this week we found out that Chris’ uncle was admitted to the hospital last Saturday with breathing problems. He has terrible lungs and he’s become quite frail over the last year or two. He’s still in the hospital (different one from Chris) and we aren’t sure when he’ll be discharged as they are now doing other tests on him for other problems that he has.

2. Last night at 10 pm as I frantically ran around tidying up the house for the in-laws that I’d just learned were in town (ARghhhhhH!) Chris’ cousin (son of uncle above) called. I thought he might be calling because he’d heard about Chris or to let us know how his father was doing but no … he had other bad news. His younger brother, 37, had a heart attack early Thursday morning! When he went to emerg with Chest pains they discovered the heart attack and then did further tests – he apparently had three blood clots in his arm (a piece of one probably broke off and caused the heart attack) and when they did an angiocath they found that three of his coronary arteries were blocked so he had angioplasty. He now has some heart damage from the heart attack. Oh and yes he apparently has high cholesterol – not sure when that was diagnosed but he’s on Lipator now for it.

3. And finally Chris’ chest pain, possible arrhythmia and upcoming angiocath.

Of the three Chris seems to be the healthiest at the moment. I sure hope it stays that way and that nothing else happens!

So … if you don’t hear from me much over the next few days you now know why. I’ll be going back and forth to the hospital to see Chris and coming home periodically to take care of the dog. Luckily the hospital is a less than 10 minute walk away!

Naturally, I called Chris’ parents right after I got off the phone with his doctor. I then proceeded to get ready to go to the hospital to see Chris and packed a bag with some things I thought he might need.

I got home a bit after 8 pm after being sent home by Chris to feed the dog (much later than normal). Once I was done taking care of Midnight I returned a few calls and tried to call Chris’ parents. They weren’t home so I left a message. Chris called me at about 9 pm to tell me that “guess what? My parents are here!! Is it ok if they stay the night?”

So the in-laws have descended! I knew they’d come … they had been going to come for at least a day visit to see Chris’ uncle on Saturday, but I guess their son being in the hospital spurred them on.

So I’ve got Chris’ mom and dad and his aunt here sleeping in our spare bedrooms. I get along with them ok, but they do kind of drive me batty … so this is only adding to my stress! Oh and the first thing my Father in law said to me upon arriving was to ask if I could help them find a hotel for tomorrow night. Huh … why’d I rush around making up beds for them tonight? Why bother spending only one night here if you plan to stay for two … they might as well stay here both nights (as much as I might go nuts at the thought!).

Well if you’ve made it to the end of my long tale I thank you! I know I rattled on, but I feel a little better getting all of this off my chest. Now that it’s going on 2: 00 a.m. I really should try to get some sleep if I can. I think I’m still a little too stressed or jumpy to sleep though. Hmmm maybe I should eat? I really haven’t eaten since this afternoon, yeah that might be an idea.

Thoughts and prayers always appreciated!

A stressed and worried, Trish

Where’s the off button for the snow?

January 28, 2009 by Tricia

Well … we’re in the midst of another big snowstorm here in Toronto. Man I’m getting sick of snow!

It wouldn’t be so bad if I only had to look at it, but of course it’s coming down so heavily that I had to shovel a couple of times today. One poor man that lives on the corner across from me has been out shoveling most of the day … that’s one of the things about having a corner property – more to shovel! Plus he did some shoveling for the older lady on the corner across from him too.

Chris was up at 5:30 am for a 7:30 shift but he too did a little shoveling before he went to work, then our new neighbors (the renters) beside us must have shoveled the beginning of the driveway that we share. So by the time I got out I still had a lot of shoveling to do as it snowed heavily in the morning, but not as much as I would have if Chris and our neighbor hadn’t helped out a bit. I shoveled some of our corner neighbors sidewalk – in part to be nice and also because when I take Midnight out for a quick outing to do her business we walk up and down that section of the sidewalk as she finds a place on the snowbank to do her thing.

Still, my back went out after only about five minutes of shoveling. Darn back! it seems I can’t do much of anything that requires me to bend slightly forward (let alone lifting heavy snow) like sweeping, vacuuming, doing the dishes, sitting on the couch and leaning forward to read something or leaning forward as I watch tv … all of those things throw my back out or well, put it into spasms. I want to have my back xrayed to see if something is wrong. It’s been bad like this for about a year now and I suspect that my Vitamin D deficiency has something to do with it.

With my back aching I wasn’t able to do too much today. I had been planning to do at least 30 minutes on the Wii Fit balance board, but that didn’t happen. At least I can add my shoveling activities to the calender! For those of you with Wii Fit – don’t forget that you can add light, medium and heavy activities by going to the calender – it helps build up those fitness credits for the fitness bank and you might as well count your none Wii activities too. I’ve counted some of my time playing Wii Sports as “light” activities (even though they feel at least moderate to me!).

Luckily with my back I find that if I lie down on my side or flat on my back for a while the muscle spasms tend to stop. That’s not the case today as my back is still spasming as I type, but it sometimes takes the ache away.

As I waited for my back to feel better I watched some TV. I like watching old sitcom reruns like All in the Family, Fresh Prince and so on. One of the channels that I watch these old shows on bugs me though … well I mean the commercials it plays! They always have these commercials for “schools” that will teach you how to be a CSI, parole officer or that teach you how to get healthcare jobs. It drives me nuts because every single commercial break has one of these ads and if it doesn’t it’s that AGI commercial offering funeral insurance! Bleh! Luckily with the PVR I can put the show on pause for a few minutes and then fast forward through the commercials – when I remember to do it!

So how’s the weather in your area? I’m thankful that we didn’t get an ice storm! Our snow storm is apparently part of that big ice storm that hit the States earlier in the week, but without the ice. Thank God!

Sore from playing with my new Wii

January 23, 2009 by Tricia

Well … I guess it’s about time I update you on that Wii Fit that I bought on eBay almost two weeks ago now.

First off … yes I only bought the Wii Fit. None of the descriptions of the Wii Fit and balance board on ebay stated that you needed the console with it. In fact the offer that I bid on and won said that it came with all the cables and every thing needed to play … obviously the guy never used a Wii Fit balance board because there are NO cables! LOL But I didn’t know that at the time.

Shortly after I won my bid on the Wii Fit I discovered that I needed the console as well. Bummer – now I’d have to shell out even more money if I wanted to use the Wii Fit that I bought or I’d have to cancel my order/payment. In the end I decided to get the console and I found one for sale – brand new that came with Wii Sports as well as the Wii Play game an extra remote and nunchuk. All for about $50 more than I’d pay for it in the store if any stores actually had them in stock.

Once the Wii Fit and Wii Console arrived I had 14 games to play – not including every thing that’s on the Wii fit disk, and the ability for two people to play considering we’d have two remotes and two nunchuks.

The Wii fit arrived last Friday, but I has to wait until Monday for the Wii console to arrive. Other than playing a few games on Monday night after we got it set up I didn’t really get started with the Wii Fit until Tuesday.

I’ve used the Wii Fit and played Wii games all week (only an hour or so each day – not all day!) – three days in a row excluding today because my muscles are SORE! I’m aching all over! Yes, I’m that out of shape! Being sick for three years and now having muscles that are weak because of Vitamin D deficiency is likely making it a little harder for me as far as playing the games and using the Wii Fit board. My balance totally sucks! LOL

Anyway … given that I’m already feeling the exercises and extra activities that I’ve been doing there’s no way I’ll ever need weight loss pills to lose the few extra pounds that I’ve gained while I’ve been sick. I just have to stick to doing my Wii Fit daily and as I get stronger adding more outdoor activities.

When I first wrote about buying the Wii Fit a few people commented that they were surprised I hadn’t bought anything on eBay before … well I’ve got another first for you. Early Thursday morning (like 2 a.m.) I was checking out the Wii games on Amazon Canada and I decided to buy three that I’d been reading about over the last two weeks. I’d never made an Amazon purchase before – but now I have.

I bought We Ski, Rayman Raving Rabbids TV Party and Big Beach Sports. The first two can be used with the Wii Balance board for some of the games. I chose those games because they had pretty good reviews, some can be used with the balance board and all are active games. I definitely need to get more active and I figure this can’t hurt.

Have any of you used or purchased any of the last three games I mentioned? How do you like them?

The games arrived today! Talk about fast service – that’s only one day after I ordered them! As I said earlier, my muscles are so sore today that I didn’t even take the cellophane of the packages until this evening and neither Chris nor I have played the games this evening. I have a feeling we’ll both be playing a lot of Wii this weekend though!

Oh and we also connected the Wii to the internet this evening as well. We have a router so it was really easy. Now we can updates on the console and some of the games if there are any.

Hopefully getting back to blogging

January 22, 2009 by Tricia

I’m sorry that I haven’t been posting much in the last week and a half or so. I’ve been very sick again.

I was actually in the hospital last week for a few days. My Crohn’s really flared up so I had to be treated in the hospital and stay there for observation for a while. God I hate being sick.

I haven’t been doing much since I got home. Just resting and slowly getting a bit better.

While I was away from home our closest neighbors- the ones on the other side of our semi-detached house had their baby! I didn’t even know she was so close to her delivery date. They had a little girl. I haven’t met her yet, but I did hear her cry once. I’m sure we’ll hear the baby more when she gets a little bigger and has stronger lungs for those cries!

Our other new neighbors – on the other side of our house – seem to be stocking up on cat supplies! Earlier today I saw the “boyfriend” going in and out of the house with Cat litter bags! They told us when they moved in that they have two cats, but with the amount of cat liter they brought in earlier today they either have a houseful of cats or they got a deal on the stuff! LOL

Hopefully I’ll feel well enough to get back to regular blogging soon. In the meantime I’m going to watch some of the shows we’ve been taping on our PVR .. I’m looking forward to seeing CSI and Ugly Betty tonight.

I hope you’ve had a better week than me!

Chris is home from the hospital and feeling better!

Chris is in the Acute Cardiac Care ward at our hospital

Where’s the off button for the snow?

Sore from playing with my new Wii

Hopefully getting back to blogging

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