Mike from MI Iron Brigade
New member
This was posted on another forum. He needs our prayers!
I had a serious heart attack while home for lunch last Saturday. My guess is it's at least the 4th one I've had in the last 2 years or so. Since early last spring I've gone to our plant medical facility twice with chest pain and they ran a quick EKG and pronounced my heart to be okay, but demanded I contact my personal physician for a follow-up. HE wrote it off as a torn pectoral muscle. Earlier attacks (the 1st one was back in 1990) were thought to be bouts of acid reflux. This attack felt much like the previous ones, but the pain escalated to the point where I could no longer bear it and I had Nancy call 911.
The paramedics didn't seem too concerned, and they took their sweet time getting me loaded into the ambulance after they ran their initial tests -- but at least they were concerned enough to cover their butts by hauling me in to the ER. No lights, no siren, and we stopped for all of the traffic lights -- making what COULD have been a 10 minute ride last for over 20 minutes. About an hour after arriving at the ER they finally hit me with some morphine to ease the intense pain (nitroglycerin didn't help -- which made them more certain I was NOT having heart problems). 2 or 3 minutes after the morphine started to work the pain intensified again, and I remember hearing a techie say "oh no" -- he's gone into tachycardia" (just one step away from fibrillation in some cases). FINALLY I had their full attention. The docs later told me that about a third of the folks who experience what I did drop dead on the spot...
Anyway, I had angioplasty on Sunday and again on Monday. 2 stents were inserted and a balloon job was done on a small artery that was fully blocked. They sent me home yesterday with a boat load of pills to take, and rehab starts next week. If all goes well I'll go back to work in about a month , and as far as I'm concerned if I'm well enough to return to work I'll be well enough to swing the XLT -- weather permitting. As for now, I'm dog-tired and sleeping 10-12 hours per day. Fortunately we have enough money socked away so that this should only prove to be a financial inconvenience rather than a financial disaster. My biggest challenge will probably be quitting my 38 year old smoking habit (I'm 51 currently). God once sovereignly delivered me of smoking, but I took it up again during a time of difficult trials and I've failed in every subsequent attempt at quitting -- so I'm asking for the help of you praying saints that I know are lurking around here.
This whole episode probably explains the lethargy I've suffered with much of the time for the past few years... Hopefully by next spring I'll be posting in the main forum regarding all of the silver dollars and gold dubloons I'll be dredging up with the help of my trusty XLT... God willing.
Shalom,
Mark TPK
I had a serious heart attack while home for lunch last Saturday. My guess is it's at least the 4th one I've had in the last 2 years or so. Since early last spring I've gone to our plant medical facility twice with chest pain and they ran a quick EKG and pronounced my heart to be okay, but demanded I contact my personal physician for a follow-up. HE wrote it off as a torn pectoral muscle. Earlier attacks (the 1st one was back in 1990) were thought to be bouts of acid reflux. This attack felt much like the previous ones, but the pain escalated to the point where I could no longer bear it and I had Nancy call 911.
The paramedics didn't seem too concerned, and they took their sweet time getting me loaded into the ambulance after they ran their initial tests -- but at least they were concerned enough to cover their butts by hauling me in to the ER. No lights, no siren, and we stopped for all of the traffic lights -- making what COULD have been a 10 minute ride last for over 20 minutes. About an hour after arriving at the ER they finally hit me with some morphine to ease the intense pain (nitroglycerin didn't help -- which made them more certain I was NOT having heart problems). 2 or 3 minutes after the morphine started to work the pain intensified again, and I remember hearing a techie say "oh no" -- he's gone into tachycardia" (just one step away from fibrillation in some cases). FINALLY I had their full attention. The docs later told me that about a third of the folks who experience what I did drop dead on the spot...
Anyway, I had angioplasty on Sunday and again on Monday. 2 stents were inserted and a balloon job was done on a small artery that was fully blocked. They sent me home yesterday with a boat load of pills to take, and rehab starts next week. If all goes well I'll go back to work in about a month , and as far as I'm concerned if I'm well enough to return to work I'll be well enough to swing the XLT -- weather permitting. As for now, I'm dog-tired and sleeping 10-12 hours per day. Fortunately we have enough money socked away so that this should only prove to be a financial inconvenience rather than a financial disaster. My biggest challenge will probably be quitting my 38 year old smoking habit (I'm 51 currently). God once sovereignly delivered me of smoking, but I took it up again during a time of difficult trials and I've failed in every subsequent attempt at quitting -- so I'm asking for the help of you praying saints that I know are lurking around here.
This whole episode probably explains the lethargy I've suffered with much of the time for the past few years... Hopefully by next spring I'll be posting in the main forum regarding all of the silver dollars and gold dubloons I'll be dredging up with the help of my trusty XLT... God willing.
Shalom,
Mark TPK
