#8 BEYOND CANCER/ADDITIONAL HEALTH ISSUES-HEART SCARE
Welcome back to Faith Walk with Debbie! During chemotherapy I had a scare that something might be wrong with my heart. I will share about that experience.
On August 31, 2021, I went for my weekly oncology visit. I had been feeling pressure in my chest. During my exam, the oncologist noticed that my Oxygen level was higher than normal. Because of that and the chest pressure, she sent me to the emergency room. I knew that meant I’d be there for at least four to five hours. My husband had not gone with me to that appointment. So I called and told him the frustrating news. He came to the emergency room and stayed with me.
The emergency room medical team ran multiple tests including EKG, X-ray, Labs and CAT Scan. I actually was very pleased with their thoroughness trying to diagnose the problem. Everything came back great except the Troponin level was just a tiny bit high. The emergency room doctor felt it necessary to keep me over night to monitor that lab level.
I was overwhelmed. No-way did I want to spend the night in the hospital. I could not ever remember staying overnight in a hospital except for when I had my children. I asked my husband to stay with me. He was not thrilled with the idea but he agreed. However, because I did not know I was going to be admitted, he went home to get a few essentials. He slept on the couch in my room that night. I attempted to sleep but every few hours the nurse came in to take my blood for the lab test. I was exhausted by the next morning.
I already had my 3-month Echocardiogram scheduled for that next morning. However, because I had been admitted to the hospital they could not use the outpatient EKG order they had. We had to wait for them to order an in-hospital EKG. It literally took almost all day for them to do the EKG and get the results. We waited and waited. Finally the on-call cardiologist came to see me. He was not the cardiologist that I originally had chosen. However, I really liked him. He took plenty of time to discuss everything with me. I asked if he would continue to be my cardiologist or if I would go back to the one I had originally scheduled with. Because I had never seen the original one, he said he would now be my cardiologist. I believe that could have been God intervening. I had no idea which cardiologist to choose locally. So God chose the right one for me. I really like his personality and he’s very thorough. He said the Echocardiogram results was good. My regular doctor ended up dismissing me from the hospital about 24 hours after I went to the emergency room.
Because my lab results continued to be a little bit high, the cardiologist scheduled me for a stress test. On September 15, 2020, I experienced my first stress test. An embarrassing side note. Because I was having bad diarrhea as a chemo side-effect, I was concerned I might have an accident during the stress test. So to be safe, they had me put on a depends. I had never worn one before. It felt really weird but at least I had confidence if I had an accident, I wouldn’t be totally embarrassed.
They hooked me up to all kinds of electrical wires. I then got on a tread mill. This lady talked to me the entire time. I did not really feel that I got winded very much. However, all of a sudden she said I could stop. I had to lay in a specific position on this bed while another tech ran an instrument over me. I think it was an EKG. I remember being very out of breath when I went to lay down which kind of concerned me.
I met with the cardiologist on September 28, 2020 for the stress test results. The stress test showed abnormal. The cardiologist was concerned there was a 85-90% probability that there was blockage. He put me on an aspirin a day. The cardiologist recommended a heart catheterization. Fear over took me. I had already been through so much that year. I could not imagine heart problems on top of the other stuff I was going through. Again I felt I had no choice but to be a robot through all the procedures required.
On October 1, 2020, I experienced my first heart catheterization. My cardiologist explained very well what they did. They numbed the right groin area before the procedure. He then inserted the catheter. It HURT. Not quite sure why it hurt so bad when he inserted it. Next thing I knew, he commented that he was up in the heart. He said there was only 10-20 % blockage in 1 artery which was very minimal. He mentioned some of my veins looked like cork screws which could be an indication of high blood pressure. He showed me on the screen what they looked like. He said we would monitor my blood pressure and probably put me on some medicine once chemotherapy was all done and after I had surgery in December. He was very pleased with the results and basically said the Stress Test was a False Positive, meaning the results were inaccurate. Even though I went through the catheterization as a result of the Stress Test giving a bad report, I felt relieved that my heart did not have major blockage and overall looked good. After the procedure was done, I was bandaged. My husband was allowed to go into the hospital with me. He waited in the waiting room during the procedure. I had limitations on activity for a couple weeks after the procedure.
On October 29, 2020 the cardiologist had me scheduled to see his nurse practitioner. Because my chest still felt weird, we both decided to have a heart monitor test. I was supposed to wear the heart monitor for two weeks but the adhesive really caused a lot of irritation. I think it was worse because I still had breaking out from the chemo reaction. Because the adhesive caused so much irritation, I only wore the heart monitor for a week. I then sent the machine away for the test results to be analyzed.
In November I had to have another Echocardiogram as a routine check. It came back normal and the Heart monitor test came back normal. So I was very relieved that there was nothing major wrong with my heart! Praise the Lord! God answered prayer! I came to the conclusion the chest pressure basically was the result of a chemo side effect. I continued to have chest pressure and occasionally felt almost like passing out until chemotherapy was done. Once chemotherapy was over, the chest odd feelings subsided.
I want to thank you again for coming on this journey. This episode was very difficult. I really was scared that I would get bad news again. I tried to have faith. I had lots of people agreeing in prayer with me. The scripture verse I want to share with you is powerful. Matthew 17:20 (NLT) “’You don’t have enough faith,’ Jesus told them. I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.” So we do not have to have great faith to have prayer answered. Even a small amount of faith can move mountains so prayer can be answered. I thank God that the mountain of heart problems was moved in my life at that time.
I also want to remind you to look on my website www.faithwalkdebbie.com under the heading entitled Meaningful Scriptures. I have listed many scriptures that have been encouragement to me through this journey. Hopefully they will encourage you.
Join me next time as I interview my husband. I thought it would be good if you heard from a care giver and his perspective of this journey.
