Appointment at the cardiologist was pretty uneventful. Dr. Mendelson seemed surprised I’m doing so well with such a diverse and staggering quantity of heart defects. She asked me a couple times who referred me, and why I was there, but my answer never wavered: I want a Cardiologist familiar with, and who has seen many other adult congenital heart patients. And here’s the funny part: she more than proved my point.
Luna is back from the vet, and she’s been diagnosed with severe hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Her left ventricle is enlarged and there was a clot forming in her left atrium. She’s been prescribed Lasix, Enalapril (what I take, ironically enough), Plavix, and Aspirin. Basically, they’re throwing everything they have at her in an effort to keep her from forming clots, ease her heart’s workload, and clear any fluid that backs up into her lungs.
Luna is spending the night at an animal hospital tonight.
When I got home from work on Monday, Luna didn’t greet me with her usual persistent demand to sit on my lap. In fact, she looked rather miserable sprawled on a plastic shopping bag. A couple hours later, she relocated to the corner behind the toilet. Since then, she has wandered about the apartment as though addled, refraining from eating or drinking.
Well, I found out why I’m hitting a wall with my DDR skills, and why I simply can’t do hard 10-footers or the nasty level 11s, 12s, and 13s of ITG. I long believed this to be the case, but I ran into a study by the American Heart Association that specifically covers patients with a corrected transposition by the Mustard procedure, congenitally corrected transposition, and a similar group having undergone a revised Fontan.
At precisely 11:16PM tonight, I’ll have persisted upon this world for a grand-total of three decades. To understand the true significance of this, I believe I should clarify.
I was born on September 18th, 1977 in Washington State, and since that day, life hasn’t taken kindly to my presence. Two months passed, and I went into congestive heart failure; not a heart-attack exactly, but hint enough I wasn’t meant to live.
