Follow up on testing with EP

I had my follow up appointment today to go over all the testing I had with the Cardio/EP dr I went and saw last month. It was of course, a LONG morning, between driving down in commuter traffic, to waiting an unusual amount of time for the DR to come in...But alas...He arrived, with answers.

First off. The echo was normal. so YAY about that!

The event/loop monitor showed no arrhythmias...Also super good!

The tilt table test, although it did not show the "gold standard" , it did show some interesting results in regards to the hypersensitivity from the iso. Basically, the results from that and my history, I was given the diagnosis of neurocardiogenic syncope, also known as  Neurally mediated syncope.  Which is a dysfunction of the autonomic system. It is a sub set of POTS, which he thought might be the final diagnosis. Either way, they are groups into a syndrome called, dysautonomia.

Treatment:

Increase salt and fluid intake to reduce triggers. And, I started on a beta blocker called, Toprol XL. Starting at 25 mgs....

So, all in all. It went great. I learned I am NOT crazy, hopefully, I can start feeling a bit better, with the addition of medications. Hopefully not forever...

Limbo land...

It seems we have found ourselves stuck in a strange and uncomfortable land...Limbo Land...What was once solid, concrete plans, are now thrown to the wind...And we wait...We are trying to be patient.....If you didn't already know, patience is NOT one of my best character traits, lol.

Ok, I will back up a little bit...And take you through this little journey from the beginning...

In September 2013, I had some health issues, that landed me in emergency surgery, which resulted in some unforeseen complications (they accidently cut open my colon, yes those things DO happen..lol)..It left us a bit shaken, and we decided to stop playing around and living in this mundane cycle of just going through the motions, and start talking about our next 5 and 10 year goals etc. We had to make some hard decisions about where we were going to be headed once we left NY (we have been set on leaving NY for years, just had not been 100% certain on the location in which we wanted to go to after leaving) And downsizing the house when we buy again,, and what possibly part time work for me would look like...It was all exhausting, thinking about hypotheticals...We agreed though, that these things needed to happen sooner rather than later, and we gave ourselves till feb 2014, to figure out what we were going to do.... But, we also agreed, we needed to take a little "break" from the real life stuff too and have some FUN together!... 

After such a crazy last couple of years, with numerous pregnancy losses, church craziness, ending of relationships with people you thought you trusted, and then, just plain stupid decisions made by us, and subsequently, reaping natural consequences from ALL those choices...It just plain sucked... But  can tell you...MANY, many lessons were learned...It is funny how you learn more in the hard times, than in the good...Anyway...I digress.

After much discussion, we decided to bite the bullet and take a trip to see my parents out in California. It had been nearly 7 years since we had been out...We needed a vacation...I NEEDED to see my MOM, especially after that surgery scare.....It was a win, win...And it JUST so happened, some unforeseen money come our way, and I scored the plane tix for less than half the regular price!!!...We were over the moon! 

The 12 days we spent in California, back in Oct/Nov were absolutely soul soothing, heart healing, and magical... We made so many amazing memories...

It was about halfway through our trip, when I realized my husband was seeming a bit intense..No doubt, the conversations we had before vacation were weighing on him , now that he had no work to take away from that focus...I knew something was turning in his head, I just did not know what.  The next day or so after probing a little ( ok, a LOT)...It finally came out...He had began to consider moving out to CA...I was a bit shocked...I did notice how much more affordable the housing was in the area we liked,  and even taxes were cheaper...But most of all...My parents were out there....

Many of you remember me saying.. I will NEVER, ever, ever move back to Cali, ever!"...Well, its kind of this running joke me and God have...I say "never", and he says, "Oh REALLY!?...we will see about that...lol" ( Yes God LOL's at me, we have that kind of relationship... heheheh)......You see,  stuff happens...Perspectives are shifted by experiences, good and bad...People change. I have changed. 

When we had discussed moving in the past, ( and we have planned on leaving NY for years) moving to a warmer, sunnier area was KEY...We had thought NC, SC or TX possibly. But none of those places had family close by. Jared's mom is here in NY and mine is in CA...Staying in NY was OUT of the question, for so many reasons. So, I began to see the logic behind his thinking...Especially since we were seeing it was affordable, and doable. We decided to kind of bench the idea till we were back home and had our real life glasses on, and not the vacation ones that made everything seem possible ..LOL...But both of us kept thinking about it...I could tell each time our eyes would meet, and we both had a certain smile...

We got back home, and  we talked some more, and decided to see what a transfer with his company would look like. Things were getting more serious, much more than we anticipated, especially so soon! After a couple meetings with a few of his boss's, we had gotten word, the end of February/beg. March would be our target date to move! We were shocked, and sooo excited! We rushed to get the house ready to sell, and packed about 80 percent of our things, downsized, etc and even through the holidays, kept focused. At the start of Jan 2014, we listed. 

End of jan 2014...We get news from the corporate chain at Jared's work, that cuts are being made, and "restructuring" is happening, so the transfer may be pushed out till april but no worries...Ok, No big deal...

Beginning of Feb..."It could be 6 to 8 months, maybe longer"...Basically NO one knows what is going on...And TONS of people are being told they cannot transfer for 18 months or more, no matter what the location is...So it isn't just our transfer that is being affected. 

One sliver of hope is, he reached out to a past mentor who works with the company still, and is now at headquarters. He is going to see if any of his contacts can assist in getting this transfer moved through sooner, and possibly with an even better position than we initially thought! There are NO guarantees, but we are praying for some favor here... 

In other news...The House selling...UGH...All I will say is, the next house we buy, I will DIE in, before I sell again...It is just utter ridiculousness! Dealing with the buyers flaky, unprofessional agents is grating in my nerves...BUT, my house has never been this clean, consistently...LOL! We have had a couple of "almost offers" but it was between us and another house, and the other houses won. But in hindsight, had we accepted an offer and pushed to close sooner, rather than later, we might be homeless, waiting for this darn transfer! So, I am not going to get discouraged about that one bit. 

I just have a pet peeve about people who have no courtesy for others when scheduling showings, and either coming uber late and displacing us for 3 hours with 4 kids and a dog in 10 below weather, just to say "meh, I don't like the yard", to just plain not showing up, and after cleaning for 3 hours I was less than thrilled....But, I guess it is all apart of the "experience"...One I hope to NOT relive again! 

Adventures in my crazzzzyyy life....

So, about a month ago, I met with a cardiologist and electrophysiologist, from Albany Medical center, about some episodes I have been having for a while now. Come to think of it, I have always had a variation of these kids if issues since I was a child, but was misdiagnosed for years and years. Anyway, The episodes are similar to fainting, but with some pre syncope issues, like flushing, cold sweats, cold extremities, nausea, headaches, dizziness, then eventually my heart rate goes funky and so does my blood pressure, and BAM, down I go...No real rhyme or reason to it, and nothing I can do to stop it...It is NOT from "getting up too fast", or anything of that sort. The plan was to see the cardio/EP doctor, and let him do some tests and make a determination about the causes and get an official diagnosis.

When I had my initial consult, he mentioned, based on my history and symptoms, that it seems as though there is a problem in my autonomic nervous system, which is causing the reflexes that control my heart rate and blood pressure to NOT work properly. WHY that is happening, and what the exact causes are,  are unknown right now, the tests he wanted to do would help us see a bit better. So I scheduled my tests a few weeks later, and last tuesday, I went in...

..It was rather eventful!

I will back up though, and start from the beginning...

I went back down to Albany, and checked in at my cardiologists office for the testing that needed to be done.  First test on the list, Echocardiogram.

I went in, got on the LOVELY gown ( shown above)

Then , a wonderful tech came in and probed my chest for 25 minutes...No word back on those results yet...I will get that info in Feb 25th.

As soon as that was done, I got dressed, and waited for the Tilt table test ( aka- TTT)...

I was slightly nervous before, but nothing major. I had done a little reading, and even watched a few youtube vids from the mayo clinic on TTT's, so I was aware of what they were going to do, and knowing about it, helped to reduce any anxiety. They called me back, and had me take off most of my top wear, and put back on another gown, then waited, while they went over the test, risks, and what they were trying to find etc...It all seemed easy enough...

Then, they started to hook me up to all the machines...Holy crap, was it a LOT of wires!! They would not let me fiddle with my phone or take pics..Boo...lol...But in hindsight, I am glad...

So, the first part of the test, you start out laying flat. They get a baseline heart rate and blood pressure. Then they raise me,  to a mostly standing position, while strapped down to a table, also, while continuing to monitor. This goes on for 45 minutes. If I were to have passed out in the first 45 minutes, they would have stopped the test, and had the results needed. But, I stayed awake. Which is not uncommon. Many people dont pass out on the TTT.  I had many issues with fluctuations, but none severe enough to cause me to pass out in that first 45 mins.

After the 45 mins, they lay you back down, for about 5 minutes. They then preped an IV line to give fluids, and so that they could administer a medication called Isoproterenol intravenously. It acts as a artificial adrenaline, to speed up the heart rate. Then they stand you up again for 30 mins, unless you pass out before then....

Well...Things did not go as planned when they gave me the meds through the IV...I ended up having a bad reaction...Once they stood me back up, and started the meds, I was immediately unable to breathe, move, talk etc...It was as if I was being drowned!  My heart rate SHOT up, super fast, my muscles started shaking and I started to have hot flashes and cold sweats...The monitors started going off, they stopped the meds, and started me on oxygen ASAP, but nothing helped...THEY started kind of freaking out, which freaked ME out...Then They laid me flat, to try and stabilize my heart rate and blood pressure. I did not even get to complete the second half of the test. They were all freaked out by the event, and made the DR come in and see me before I could go home, because it was soooo crazy! None of them had ever seen anyone react to the meds that way before. I was slightly traumatized...It was a bit much for me...My body is still so tired, even now from it all, even almost a week later!

Anyway, I ended up, after all was said and done, with a 30 day event/loop monitor, that will continuously monitor my heart for any abnormalities over the course of the next 25- 30 days...Here is a peek at my new "best friend" for the next few weeks...

This little gadget will go with me EVERYWHERE, 24/7 except  in shower..Fun fun...

NOT!

This monitor is a pain in the BUTT...I am allergic to the sticky pads, and the wires irritate me...I will be sooooo glad when this is over, and we have some answers, hopefully!