Misadventures of Mom
- Thread starter Arwen's Mom
- Start date
Arwen's Mom
Mother of Dragons, Breaker of Chains
First...when I told Barry that Pat posted on the forum, he said "did anyone ask 26 or 29? Aluminum or carbon? can I still go out in the cold? single speed or geared? is that a full suspension stent or hardtail? is that thing clipped it or not?"
I almost fell off the bed laughing.
next, a little mushiness from me:
The amount of “comradery” I have seen here on this forum, between people with different beliefs and life styles is truly miraculous. Different life styles, religious and spiritual beliefs, different nationalities/cultures/race, different economic “classes,” I could go on but wont, are all traversed by something as simple as a machine based on circles and motion. Something I used to say long ago, that at the time I thought was silly, but makes more sense to me today “circular motions make people smile.” Yes they do. And in my dear *****’s case, helped to save his life.
I want to thank all of you for your prayers and positive thoughts. While I do believe in prayers, I also believe in the power of the mind and the energy it can create. So thank ALL of you, but especially to Pat I extend a warm hug. Thank you for being there my friend.
So after further reflection, I also want to share:
This has been the hardest thing I have ever gone through:
And I dont say that lightly. I have lived homeless for a couple years, and lived with an abusive person for 12 years. Experienced childbirth twice and almost went through losing those 2 through various means a couple times. But this was different. Very different.
This month has been tough for me.
One after another things were dumped into my life, that even my Christian friends were beginning to scratch their heads like "why?"
One after another I tried to be positive and "count my blessings"
But as I focused on a blessing, it too was attacked. Till one point I just held my wrists up and said "go ahead God, just cut them and drain them now and get it over with." I was very angry, depressed, hopeless. Honestly, the only time I smiled was when I was riding.
Then on day I said to a friend, "I am not letting all this get to me, because I have a wonderful husband and relationship with him and we have our health." I said this at 7am on Wednesday.
No joke, THAT SAME DAY AT 10am my husband suffered a heart attack.
Really.
I looked up at God and said "Are you KIDDING ME!!!! what am I, part of a comedy skit or something? Wanna write another book to the Bible called Jill Marie and put it next to Job?"
BUT, and this is a HUGE BUT,
My dear ***** is home now and ok (relatively speaking)
There was some miraculous occurrences.
Like the Dr who saw the MINUTE irregularity in his ekg and insisted he stay for observation, after other doctors wanted to send him home the first day.
Or the fact my ***** has a physical weirdness like an extra artery feeding his heart. The "normal" artery while having been 98% blocked and needing a stent, is not really needed after all, since he came with "spare parts." (Titanium/carbon remarks are allowed)
Or the fact that after a heart attack, he sustained NO PERMANENT damage to his heart.
He is currently taking 4 meds and has to rest and take it easy for awhile. But prognosis is good and we are praying and believing that with the right diet and herbs he will be off the meds soon.
His cardio dr came right out and said, "the biking you guys have been doing helped to condition his heart and helped to save his life"
And all this time I thought the biking was all for me 🙄
So pray, or send positive thoughts our way.
Unless you have been through this, you cannot imagine the whirlwind of thoughts that go through your mind at a time like this.
I truly understand the scripture that says "and the two shall become one"
I cannot imagine life without Barry. I dont think I had a life until Barry. He truly is my other half (the better one too).
Unless you have been through this, you cant imagine the whirlwind of thoughts that go through your mind, from the worst feeling of losing your life partner to stupid practical concerns like who is gonna change the oil in the car now?
I may write more on this later. But for now I just wanted to share:
Cherish EVERY moment you have
Cherish your spouse and other people that God has placed in your life, for you never know if they will be there tomorrow.
Treat your spouse (and others) as you want to be treated. Truly.
Bad things happen to the good AND the bad. But God does love you, regardless whether or not you believe it, or in Him.
Miracles CAN happen, but dont always happen.
And lastly, my HU88IE ROCKS!
I almost fell off the bed laughing.
next, a little mushiness from me:
The amount of “comradery” I have seen here on this forum, between people with different beliefs and life styles is truly miraculous. Different life styles, religious and spiritual beliefs, different nationalities/cultures/race, different economic “classes,” I could go on but wont, are all traversed by something as simple as a machine based on circles and motion. Something I used to say long ago, that at the time I thought was silly, but makes more sense to me today “circular motions make people smile.” Yes they do. And in my dear *****’s case, helped to save his life.
I want to thank all of you for your prayers and positive thoughts. While I do believe in prayers, I also believe in the power of the mind and the energy it can create. So thank ALL of you, but especially to Pat I extend a warm hug. Thank you for being there my friend.
So after further reflection, I also want to share:
This has been the hardest thing I have ever gone through:
And I dont say that lightly. I have lived homeless for a couple years, and lived with an abusive person for 12 years. Experienced childbirth twice and almost went through losing those 2 through various means a couple times. But this was different. Very different.
This month has been tough for me.
One after another things were dumped into my life, that even my Christian friends were beginning to scratch their heads like "why?"
One after another I tried to be positive and "count my blessings"
But as I focused on a blessing, it too was attacked. Till one point I just held my wrists up and said "go ahead God, just cut them and drain them now and get it over with." I was very angry, depressed, hopeless. Honestly, the only time I smiled was when I was riding.
Then on day I said to a friend, "I am not letting all this get to me, because I have a wonderful husband and relationship with him and we have our health." I said this at 7am on Wednesday.
No joke, THAT SAME DAY AT 10am my husband suffered a heart attack.
Really.
I looked up at God and said "Are you KIDDING ME!!!! what am I, part of a comedy skit or something? Wanna write another book to the Bible called Jill Marie and put it next to Job?"
BUT, and this is a HUGE BUT,
My dear ***** is home now and ok (relatively speaking)
There was some miraculous occurrences.
Like the Dr who saw the MINUTE irregularity in his ekg and insisted he stay for observation, after other doctors wanted to send him home the first day.
Or the fact my ***** has a physical weirdness like an extra artery feeding his heart. The "normal" artery while having been 98% blocked and needing a stent, is not really needed after all, since he came with "spare parts." (Titanium/carbon remarks are allowed)
Or the fact that after a heart attack, he sustained NO PERMANENT damage to his heart.
He is currently taking 4 meds and has to rest and take it easy for awhile. But prognosis is good and we are praying and believing that with the right diet and herbs he will be off the meds soon.
His cardio dr came right out and said, "the biking you guys have been doing helped to condition his heart and helped to save his life"
And all this time I thought the biking was all for me 🙄
So pray, or send positive thoughts our way.
Unless you have been through this, you cannot imagine the whirlwind of thoughts that go through your mind at a time like this.
I truly understand the scripture that says "and the two shall become one"
I cannot imagine life without Barry. I dont think I had a life until Barry. He truly is my other half (the better one too).
Unless you have been through this, you cant imagine the whirlwind of thoughts that go through your mind, from the worst feeling of losing your life partner to stupid practical concerns like who is gonna change the oil in the car now?
I may write more on this later. But for now I just wanted to share:
Cherish EVERY moment you have
Cherish your spouse and other people that God has placed in your life, for you never know if they will be there tomorrow.
Treat your spouse (and others) as you want to be treated. Truly.
Bad things happen to the good AND the bad. But God does love you, regardless whether or not you believe it, or in Him.
Miracles CAN happen, but dont always happen.
And lastly, my HU88IE ROCKS!
Attachments
StanInTheVan
Member
Great news! And what a touching message.
Johnny Utah
Well-Known Member
My goodness Jill, you and Barry are in my prayers. I wish you guys a speedy recovery, and hope to see you out in the trails soon, tell Barry he better have the red glasses!😉
Arwen's Mom
Mother of Dragons, Breaker of Chains
My heart has been warmed reading all your comments. Thanks so much everyone. My dear Barry has been warmed by all this as well. ven if a little embarrassed over the attention 😛
Barry reads this
But on a more serious note. This recent event has shown me a few things, just in listening to what people say when told Barry had a heart attack.
You always seem healthy
You've been active
You have always been thin.
Things are not what they seem. And being active and eating right, then taking some time off and NOT exercising and eating right, then going back again did its damage. Barry and I have tried to live a healthy life style for the past few years, and we have in the past as well. But there was a 10ish year period where we ate poorly and sat around a lot.
Thin does not always mean healthy. Even though Barry's cholesterol level is "acceptable" now, but years of meats, hotdogs, bacon, and chips with sourcream, and tons of cheese did some damage.
You can be thin and still have a cholesterol problem.
Signs of a heart attack can vary GREATLY.
People usually say pain of the left side, blah blah blah.
Barry's symptoms were more along the lines of the signs of heart attack in woman which can be very different than those typically reported in men. I have done quite a bit of reading in this area, and when Barry told me how he felt that morning I whisked him off to the er as I knew what was going on. He kept saying "it cant be a heart attack, its on the wrong side." I just kept saying in reply "its probably just indigestion but lets just go check you out and be sure, what else is insurance for anyway"
Barry's symptoms was a "crushing" or squeezing feeling on the RIGHT side. Not so much in the chest, but the shoulder and down the arm a bit. He also felt very anxious like he couldnt sit still and had to pace.
I also want to note that the er people gave him a pain killer/muscle relaxer and it did help the feeling in his arm, and at one point thought he should go home. But thankfully when a patient complains of some chest pain, they typically keep for observation for 24 hrs which enabled more people to poke at him and read his ekg. I thank God for the one discerning person who spotted that irregularity and said, maybe we need to watch him longer and get a cardiologist in here.
The point to all this?
Not sure.
Take care of your self. Eat right.
Be aware of your body and what it is trying to tell you.
Learn ALL the symptoms of heart attack for men AND women.
Report/investigate if you experience ANY of them.
Dont mess around and take chances with your heart.
As cyclists MOST of us protect our heads, protect your heart too.
I need to step up my own eating habits even more, if I am not healthy, how can I help tend to Barry?
One other thing I learned from all this. Barry doesnt want to take these meds. He hates it. I tried to compare it to our van. He said we need to start using quality oil in the van and not cheap stuff. So I told him the meds are just like a quality oil to help keep his engine properly lubricated. That seemed to work a little. But the meds make him smell funny and he doesnt like it. He says he smells like "an old person" :hmmm:
So I started doing some reading. There are foods/herbs he has to avoid while taking these meds. Funny but when you research foods/herbs to treat his "condition" its all the same foods. So we will be speaking to his Dr about weaning him off the meds and controlling this through diet/herbs/exercise.
I also wanted to say his first day home was relaxing and nervous for me. I am happy to have him home, but nervous too. He keeps calling me "nurse."
Of course he likes the assistance during bathing 😱
hmmmm what else? Oh yeah, how would you guys handle this? One of the nurses he had tending to him was a real ....how do I say this delicately...incompetent. While trying to remove his iv, she actually broke the plastic part and said "oh shit I broke it" then just left. I leaned over to look at what was going on, the plastic part the iv line plugs into was broken, there were tiny bits of plastic laying there, and the iv was leaking back out of his arm. I freaked. I went to the nurses station and asked it be tended to right away. The nurse that did it was doing wrapping up a cord on a machine. REALLY? when I asked for someone to tend to this, she came in the room and removed the iv needle completely. My thinking was that here is a needle going into his arm/veins and you left it not only open and exposed and leaking, but BROKE it and potentially could have gotten bits of plastic in the solution. Also when she discharged us the medication instructions were incomplete for his meds and I had to call later to get them. While I know everyone is "new" at some point and learning, I dont think a CARDIO patient is the place to learn. I feel I should report this to the hospital. What do you all think?
I keep telling every we really are nice, if a little weird...or outspoken and opinionated, but thats just my opinion 😉
Barry reads this
and his response: "if Johnny Utah is praying for us, what can possibly go wrong" 😀
pick up the hospital bill?
that would be nice.
But on a more serious note. This recent event has shown me a few things, just in listening to what people say when told Barry had a heart attack.
You always seem healthy
You've been active
You have always been thin.
Things are not what they seem. And being active and eating right, then taking some time off and NOT exercising and eating right, then going back again did its damage. Barry and I have tried to live a healthy life style for the past few years, and we have in the past as well. But there was a 10ish year period where we ate poorly and sat around a lot.
Thin does not always mean healthy. Even though Barry's cholesterol level is "acceptable" now, but years of meats, hotdogs, bacon, and chips with sourcream, and tons of cheese did some damage.
You can be thin and still have a cholesterol problem.
Signs of a heart attack can vary GREATLY.
People usually say pain of the left side, blah blah blah.
Barry's symptoms were more along the lines of the signs of heart attack in woman which can be very different than those typically reported in men. I have done quite a bit of reading in this area, and when Barry told me how he felt that morning I whisked him off to the er as I knew what was going on. He kept saying "it cant be a heart attack, its on the wrong side." I just kept saying in reply "its probably just indigestion but lets just go check you out and be sure, what else is insurance for anyway"
Barry's symptoms was a "crushing" or squeezing feeling on the RIGHT side. Not so much in the chest, but the shoulder and down the arm a bit. He also felt very anxious like he couldnt sit still and had to pace.
I also want to note that the er people gave him a pain killer/muscle relaxer and it did help the feeling in his arm, and at one point thought he should go home. But thankfully when a patient complains of some chest pain, they typically keep for observation for 24 hrs which enabled more people to poke at him and read his ekg. I thank God for the one discerning person who spotted that irregularity and said, maybe we need to watch him longer and get a cardiologist in here.
The point to all this?
Not sure.
Take care of your self. Eat right.
Be aware of your body and what it is trying to tell you.
Learn ALL the symptoms of heart attack for men AND women.
Report/investigate if you experience ANY of them.
Dont mess around and take chances with your heart.
As cyclists MOST of us protect our heads, protect your heart too.
I need to step up my own eating habits even more, if I am not healthy, how can I help tend to Barry?
One other thing I learned from all this. Barry doesnt want to take these meds. He hates it. I tried to compare it to our van. He said we need to start using quality oil in the van and not cheap stuff. So I told him the meds are just like a quality oil to help keep his engine properly lubricated. That seemed to work a little. But the meds make him smell funny and he doesnt like it. He says he smells like "an old person" :hmmm:
So I started doing some reading. There are foods/herbs he has to avoid while taking these meds. Funny but when you research foods/herbs to treat his "condition" its all the same foods. So we will be speaking to his Dr about weaning him off the meds and controlling this through diet/herbs/exercise.
I also wanted to say his first day home was relaxing and nervous for me. I am happy to have him home, but nervous too. He keeps calling me "nurse."
Of course he likes the assistance during bathing 😱
hmmmm what else? Oh yeah, how would you guys handle this? One of the nurses he had tending to him was a real ....how do I say this delicately...incompetent. While trying to remove his iv, she actually broke the plastic part and said "oh shit I broke it" then just left. I leaned over to look at what was going on, the plastic part the iv line plugs into was broken, there were tiny bits of plastic laying there, and the iv was leaking back out of his arm. I freaked. I went to the nurses station and asked it be tended to right away. The nurse that did it was doing wrapping up a cord on a machine. REALLY? when I asked for someone to tend to this, she came in the room and removed the iv needle completely. My thinking was that here is a needle going into his arm/veins and you left it not only open and exposed and leaking, but BROKE it and potentially could have gotten bits of plastic in the solution. Also when she discharged us the medication instructions were incomplete for his meds and I had to call later to get them. While I know everyone is "new" at some point and learning, I dont think a CARDIO patient is the place to learn. I feel I should report this to the hospital. What do you all think?
Last edited:
Red Mosquito
Formerly RLB the Scrapple Boy
Glad he's doing well so far, best wishes for a full recovery soon!
olegbabich
Well-Known Member
Last edited:
knobbyhead
Next off the Island.
Jill -
I know somebody who had a heart attack and is not taking meds. So it can be done.
Wishing you and Barry the best.
I know somebody who had a heart attack and is not taking meds. So it can be done.
Wishing you and Barry the best.
rick81721
Lothar
Bad advice. Just because you know one person doesn't mean it's a good idea for anyone else, or even for that person.
JM please make sure the reason Barry's medications were prescribed - cholesterol level/type, blood pressure, etc - are under control. Dosages can be modified if diet/exercise/etc help.
All the best!
Arwen's Mom
Mother of Dragons, Breaker of Chains
Thanks. I am very aware of the "works for one but not everyone" thing.
Not going to take any chances with my darling! We are planning on "less than a year" and plan on doing it gradually so we can make sure blood tests etc come out they way they should, and all of course all with his Dr's knowledge.
As for his first few days home. Its nice to have him home 😀
He "tends" to me a lot, so here's my chance to "tend" to him 😛
he is anxious to get outside and start exercising again. He says he feels like nothing is wrong, and why cant we go play? I tell him, for now, just rest till you see Dr again on thursday. But we have been walking.
As a Monmouth county employee we get trained in first aid every year. You did a great thing by getting ***** to the hospital. Men will always deny anything is wrong and usually have a series of mild heart attacks hours and even days before a massive one. They usually say its just indigestion. Arm & shoulder numbness or pain is a sign of a heart attack. ***** is very lucky to have you as a wife.
I'm no dr but its my understanding that heart attacks are very treatable. I'm sure with you looking after him he will be fine and back on the bike before it hits 90 degrees. I wish you guys well.😀
I'm no dr but its my understanding that heart attacks are very treatable. I'm sure with you looking after him he will be fine and back on the bike before it hits 90 degrees. I wish you guys well.😀
Arwen's Mom
Mother of Dragons, Breaker of Chains
Thanks Pooriggy, I appreciate that.
I appreciate too how honest Mr AM and I are with each other when we dont feel "quite right" and are willing to allow the other to help make decisions on what to do about it. We feel we have a right to say how the other cares for their body, as its a shared property.....wait....did that come out right? 😛
I appreciate too how honest Mr AM and I are with each other when we dont feel "quite right" and are willing to allow the other to help make decisions on what to do about it. We feel we have a right to say how the other cares for their body, as its a shared property.....wait....did that come out right? 😛
