Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - Accidents & Injuries

Report Accidents and Injuries

Topic Date User

CABGs & climbing - a random info thread ... 14-Feb-2018 At 7:17:54 AM IdratherbeclimbingM9

Message

Thanks salty crag & gordoste.

Another month gone by so thought I'd give another update, but first a couple of clarification points of things alluded to earlier...

The time frame from my initial incident/warning sign to having a bypass procedure done, included 2 months of down-time due to waiting periods involved in seeing GP's in this rural area, along with having initial tests done, and waiting for results.
If not already mentioned, half the results came back indicating nothing out of the ordinary and due to that my Dr gave the OK for me to proceed with a pre-booked month long holiday elsewhere, after which I again saw her to get the results of the tests that hadn't arrived prior my departure.
As a side note, that holiday included considerable exercise levels surfing!

The reality was that without the down time, I went from not knowing I needed the procedure to having it done within a three week period, and this included having the Coronary Angiogram where the stenting option was ruled out in the meantime.

Additionally prior to seeing the GP to get the unusual heartbeat checked out, I'd recently had my annual health checkup which didn't pick up anything other than I was in good health.
That combined with the good results from the various tests afterwards led her to the opinion that I was OK, and it was probably dehydration on the day, so nothing to worry about...
Hmm.
I've been dehydrated before, a normal suffering undertaken on multi-day wall ascents(!), and suggested it was definitely not that; so to tick all the boxes, given the activities that I undertake and the remoter locations of same, she referred me to a Cardiologist.

At the Cardiologist's I had a heart ultrasound and a treadmill stress test where the level of resistance/pace is increased every three minutes while one is wired up with leads measuring diagnostics of blood pressure, heart rate, etc.
I had only just been ramped up for the second time and was still at a level where I could comfortably carry a conversation with her and which is way below my usual mountain biking exertion level, while she was watching a battery of screens of various outputs, and said to me, "Did you feel that?"
Me: "No, what?"
Soon after she again said "Did you notice that?"
Me again: "No, what?"

I could see the screens that were like a large TV format flat-screen broken into squares joined together, but something different outputting on each, and to my untrained eye could see heartbeat blips (as expected), but nothing that looked spikey or flat-line!
She stunned me by saying; "I'm pulling the pin on this test, as there are way too many unusual heartbeats in there for my liking!"

I was given scripts for a c0cktail of medications that effectively wrapped me up chemically in cotton wool; told I wasn't to ride my push bike or climb etc; and that she was booking me in for an Angiogram in Melbourne next week!!
After doing that procedure, that surgeon said he couldn't help me and I needed a bypass...

TimP earlier said on this thread, something to the effect that there will be no no stopping me now due to being supercharged by comparison to before, but to my understanding, that isn't quite how things work, due from a hydraulic perspective the heart circulatory system is a closed system, ie the pressure within it is predetermined by heartbeats maintaining a given pump pressure.

Without blockages the circulatory system isn't back-loading the heart, ie having it pump harder or more often to maintain pressure, but it isn't as if once blockages are bypassed that it will pump any harder than it is capable of or needs to do.

As I understand it, the additional stress on the heart by having to pump harder or more often to maintain pressure has mostly dis-benefits compared to any advantages.
The only possible advantage is that the muscular heart wall, particularly the left ventricular side may thicken and become stronger, so in future (after a bypass), doesn't have to work as hard to maintain pressure, but this is offset by the fact that under such stressing beforehand the heart swells / enlarges, which is a bad thing, as once it is no longer placed under such duress it resumes it's original size and can actually be 'floppy' (for lack of a better description) due having been overly-stretched, and this leads to inefficiency of performance in pumping with each heartbeat!

OK, so this leads me to the current period.
I've now finished a 7 week rehabilitation program at the local hospital, where apart from exercise and dietary information, the main thing I learnt was some of the many and various ways a heart can stuff up, both electrically as well as mechanically!

I was also pretty amazed at the spectrum of people going through the same program and the various levels of normality associated with their lifestyles. Of the couple of others who 'graduated' when I did, I consider myself light years ahead of them for fitness and think that they may never achieve my current level which I consider quite underdone at present; and to balance that out, I'm aware of others who make my current state appear pretty ordinary by comparison!

Sleeping on my side/s is tolerable for varying periods now without actually hurting.
Yesterday I mowed 'some' lawn and appear to have had no repercussions from it, though did require assistance starting the mower.

To my chagrin the hypersensitivity awareness of chest / heart that I had post surgery seems to have faded, as I was enjoying that. This started becoming noticeable at about week 7 and at week 12 I'm now largely back to my previously dull by comparison - take it for granted - level of awareness.
Fair dinkum, I swear that I was actually aware of my heart moving slightly in a rotational fashion with certain beats, at the height of my sensitivity. I thought I was imagining things and asked various cardio-experts about this phenomenon along the way, and actually had it confirmed that it is possible, as the heart is kind of free-hanging within the chest cavity.

Regarding awareness, I am now back in the realm of unknown re sorting whether a twinge here or a tweak there is actually procedure related, or normal muscular stiffness etc that is due to activity, and quite unrelated in any meaningful way to my recovery.

None of the potentially negative emotional side effects of what has happened to me that I was informed about, have been evident as instead I have found the process rather intriguing!
On a side note, I did have a very dejavu moment back when I was in hospital in early recovery, but making sense of such things is beyond my ken so I just accept such things...

I lent a bit of body-weight onto my arms overhead in initial chin-up position a couple of days ago to test how that feels, and it twinged sufficiently that I did not pursue the matter, so that kind of activity is still off in the future for the moment.

I'm about to go for my long awaited first push bike ride in 4 months, on easy ground, to see how that goes...

~> Listen to your body if it gives warning signals!
:-)