Not So Good News

The Scream by Edvard Munch

It was a different lifetime ago when I went to the Art Institute of Chicago (briefly before the oh-so-smart move of dropping out) and we had this painting on exhibit. I really liked it. I think it reflected my life pretty well back then. Fast forward about 20 years and I find myself feeling like this poor guy again. I really didn't want to get into this, but it appears it is now a part of my life and we might as well have full disclosure.

There is something wrong with my heart. There I wrote it. I never wrote it before because I didn't know. Of course I've had those fleeting feelings of chest tightness only to realize it was muscular, but doing what I do for a living makes one jump when a little sharp headache sets in (stroke?) or lower leg pain (am I throwing a clot?). No, I'm not a hypochondriac. I don't give those moments much thought. Until recently.

I suddenly had a leaping  heart in my chest. It felt as if my heart had stopped and missed a beat. It is actually an extra beat otherwise called a Premature Ventricular Contraction, or PVC for short which seems hilarious to the haunter in me (a lot of us build all sorts of things out of PVC pipes). It seemed to start overnight, though in retrospect I'd had one or two in the past, but it never bothered me. Now I have them a LOT. I figured it was anxiety since I am super prone to anxiety. That's the route we took for treatment and I had an echocardiogram... over a month ago.

The cardiologist's office called and the receptionist had returned an angry call of mine (it was polite) because I had waited so damn long for the results and my stress wasn't getting any better because of it. She told me the report was completely normal. So imagine my surprise and horror when my Dr's office called tonight to tell me that there were some abnormalities and that I needed to come in to discuss the results. 

So my heart did a bunch of its new flip-flops and I learned that I may actually have a problem common with people who have Marfan Syndrome. It has come up before and it is the whole reason I got sent in for the echocardiogram. 

The hilarious part of this was a really weird exchange that was had and later deleted about Marfan on Pumpkinrot's blog a few years ago. 

I really need that vacation NOW.