On Sat, 19 Jun 2004 07:06:16 +0000, Gunner wrote:

For those of you who emailed or wished me well, many many many thanks.
Im very touched by the concern of everyone. Its good to know Im
either well liked, or for those who dont, they didnt want a thread
opponent to disappear G

A bit of an explaination of what very unexpectedly happened to "good
ol hard as a rock Gunner". (ouch..sigh)

Saturday last, I had gone to Bakersfield to pick up an Old Crystal
Lake grinder for a gent, who is coming in from Salt Lake City to pick
up in the next week or two. Getting it home in mid afternoon, (around
105F, 30% humitity) I unloaded it using the Armstrong Method and the
few gadgets I have for moving Stuff around the back yard. This
involved a lot of gut busting grunting and groaning, and I stopped to
take a break. I noticed I was getting what felt like heart burn, and
it was getting a bit hard to ignore..so took a big shot of Pepto
Bismo. The pain went away. So I went back outside and kept on moving
Stuff. Pain came back. Pepto didnt help. So thinking fast, I dropped
a couple of my wife's nitro pills, and the pain went away. Cool. So
thinks me..time to take it easy. And I did, all Sunday..just did minor
bits and things. No problems all day.

This really demonstrates how "fault tolerant" the system is and how
suddenly things "go bad" when the blockage finally exceeds the system
limit. In my case I'd spent the previous weekend hauling 5gal buckets of
mud out of my basement that was the direct result of a mud slide following
a broken pipe. Other than the usual "catch your breath" breaks there were
no symptoms evident then. However, on Wednesday I noticed that a trip
up/down the stairs at work summoned a couple of dwarves that proceeded to
drive railroad spikes into my neck/shoulders. That pain would abate if I
wasn't moving quickly...


Now while Im just a simple harmless fuzzball, I do have a high pain
threshhold....and I was rapidly reaching the high end of it. The wife
demanded we head to the hospital in Bakersfield (45 miles away), so I
dropped 3 asprin, another nitro and off we went like a bat out of hell
with her driving.

Yep... And you did the same that I did, probably suspecting the worst but
hoping that it would "just go away on its own" until it became impossible
to ignore. I actually drove home (stopping at the grocery on the way),
fixed a pot of coffee and tried to eat a snack. By this time the dwarves
had summoned friends and two of them were using my chest as a mold for an
Inconel casting in addition to the ones driving spikes in my neck/shoulder.

My wife, being an ex-RN, recognised it for what it really was. But having
a pretty high pain tolerance and being the usual dumb-ass macho male, I
decided I'd finish my coffee (I knew by then that I wouldn't get any more
for quite some time) and drive my self to the ER (over the wife's
objections). That was a mistake... They NEVER forget...

To cut through the bull**** of the next couple very painful and
miserable days, much of which is mercifuly veiled with a drug filled
fog....

That's the only nice thing about the experience. They really do have the
"good drugs" (and lots of them).

My cloresteral was perfect

Yep, mine too. There's an interesting theory about this that was published
sometime back in Scientific American. You can research the article if you
want, but in brief the theory says that this sort of blockage may be the
result of inflamation in the arterial walls that rupture and cause the
blockage. That might explain why ordinarily healthy people with none of
the standard conditions/symptoms (high cholesterol, high blood pressure,
etc.) can suddenly experience one of these "cardiac events".

My right coronary aorta
http://www.pediheart.org/practitione...y/arteries.htm was 95%
plugged off, another one (cant remember ALL the names) was 50% plugged
off, and 5 more on the left side of my heart were up to 50% plugged for
a grand total of 7 blockages. Keep in mind..that my colesteral levels
were absolutely perfect and all the tests showed the heart itself was
perfect (though beating slowly) and my BP was in the high normal/low
High range.

That's kind of scary when you see the picture, isn't it?

An interesting side note..to close the hole in the femorial artery they
made..they clamp it closed and you down to the table with this big assed
C clamp for an hour or so, then clamp your leg down for the next 10
hours so the artery doesnt blow out and you bleed to death in a couple
minutes in your bed. Its actually better than it sounds..morphine..lots
of morphine....

I've had this done twice. Once in '97 for a partially blocked right illiac
artery that caused my right leg to go numb after heavy exercise and then
much later for the "big one". Believe me, the "C clamp" is a vast
improvement over the old procedure. Back then two-three nurses would take
turns manually applying pressure to the incision. Being "good medical
practitioners" they tend to err on the safe side, which means they do
their level best to try to push your leg down through the basement from
the sixth floor. It took some three hours or so and the only redeeming
value was all the "good drugs". Mercifully I slept through a good bit of
it.

By 2001 (three days before 9/11) the technology had improved
significantly. This time they used a "C clamp" with an inflatable pressure
pad. By raising the pressure in the pad to a bit above blood pressure they
can be sure that the artery stays closed. While not at all comfortable,
its a lot more bearable. (and lots of drugs help...)

I STRONGLY recommend to anyone over 40, that you get a good heart health
check up now and then. Some of the screenings may be free, or darned
cheap. If this could happen unexpectedly to me..it damned well could
happen to anyone.

I'll second that, especially if there are any of the conditions that leave
you more at risk or any family history of cardiac problems. in my case I
should probably have been having at least yearly screenings after the '98
incident. But nobody seemed overly concerned after that with possible
later problems, partly because of the very low cholesterol and low blood
pressure... I know better now..

I'm really glad your's turned out this well. Please do "become one" with
your cardiologist and keep a close watch on this.
--
The instructions said to use Windows 98 or better, so I installed RedHat.