kidding.
somewhere around the middle of january, i noticed that my heart was just absolutely pounding in my chest during moments of rest. sitting at my desk at work, i could feel it and when i looked down i half expected to see it pushing out like a tex avery cartoon.
the pulse wasn't any faster than normal, which is lower 50s when i'm resting. however it was beating so hard that i felt it had to be affecting my blood pressure. sure enough at the dentist in jan, my bp was high. then a week or so later i took it at a tom thumb pharmacy and it was 140 over 90. in the past my bp has always been around "normal" of 120 over 80.
eventually as feb came around, i started to notice the sense of a weight on my upper chest and felt like i had to take repeated, labored deep breaths to get my breath. since your heart deciding to bitch up on you suddenly is fairly serious, i went to the doctor this past monday.
sure enough, my bp in the office was 150 over 92. my ekg was normal, with one tiny blip that didn't cause any alarms. i was then told to follow up with a cardiologist, which i did yesterday. i was also put on bp medicine, with the understanding that it might not be a permanent thing.
at the cardiologist yesterday, where i was the only person under 87 in the waiting room, my bp was back to normal after 2.5 days on the meds. the nurse appeared a little surprised when she took my pulse, as it was lower 40s. once she told me the number, i was shocked as well. that means it basically beats once every 1.5 seconds, like a very old sleeping elephant.
the doc heard a heart murmur, which he said is probably unrelated to the bp issue. he wants me to come back twice more; once for a heart calcium deposit scan and a resting echocardiogram (in the same trip), then a week after that for a stress echo, where you bust your balls on a treadmill and then they take pictures of your heart.
the first time they could get me back for that first set of tests is almost a month from now. i guess they're not too concerned if they're ok with that long of a wait. i can't say i'm that concerned either, as my heart is as tough as the hide of a crocodile after it has spent its life eating people like chuck norris and rocky balboa.
i bought a home bp monitor and every time i took it last night, it was normal or slightly below and my pulse has remained at 40-44. not sure what to make of that, but i hope if i call on my heart to actually, you know, fucking work, it can crank up to acceptable levels without use of the paddles.
so anyway, if you have anything you want to tell me or any gifts you'd like to bestow upon me, you might as well go ahead and do it now.