Posts Tagged ‘hope’

Fixing My Heart…

Ever since I can remember, I’ve had quite an active little heart. It started when I was about 11 years old or so. My heart would just suddenly blast off racing, sometimes past 300 beats per minute.
Often I would just pass out when this happened, and usually by the time I came too, it had stopped. It’s something that followed me all my life with no one quite knowing why it happened, or what triggered it.
Jumping rope would often trigger it, or doing things too suddenly, sitting down too quick, especially on hot humid days.
Or getting out of a hot shower and bending over grab your slippers, or something that may have fallen on the floor.
Or, perhaps I could be just sitting perfectly still, writing, or thinking and there goes my heart, blasting off in a mad flutter of rapid beats.
It can also be triggered by caffeine, anxiety, being overly tired, alcohol and/or nicotine…especially nicotine products used for quitting smoking.
Through there years, I’ve been hooked up to EKG’s, Stress Tests and have had to wear Holter Monitors for 24 hours at a time, just to have it checked…always coming up ‘irregular heart beat’  which finally, after all these years has a procedure, to correct this, for those that can not or opt. out of taking medicine (which can have NASTY side effects) or who are not willing to wear a pace maker (me…I’ve never been told I needed one, nor did I want one). Now there is a surgery, that can induce my crazy Blasting heart  beat, and they can see where the ‘rapid fire’ is coming from and basically burn or freeze the place that is doing it..Thus preventing this from ever happening again. There is a 95% success rate and worse case scenario, is if it Does Not work, they would then have no choice then to put in a pace maker. I feel pretty good about it though, and the thought of passing out on stage during a live performance (yes this has happened) or the thought of being unable to stop the heart from racing so fast and possibly not able to call, etc…..(if the heart doesn’t stop racing, a shot must be given to put it back to it’s normal rate)…I decided to go ahead with this procedure.
I am scared out of my mind, yes, I won’t deny that. It’s on my mind quite often and this Friday, the 23rd of July, at 9am, I will be getting prepped for this procedure. The scary part for me is being ‘semi awake’ during it. They don’t put you out for this…more like you are in a kind of trippy little state of mind. There is some discomfort with it, but the Doc said it should be very minimal and brief…if it’s too uncomfortable they can increase the sedative…
The surgery takes a few hours and I should be released a few hours after that, unless for some reason they require to stay the night, which is usually not required.
WHAT TO LOOK FORWARD TO!!!
I can jump rope again, run, and perform without fearing a crazy race inside my chest, or that no one would be around, or that it would exhaust itself…. 300 or more beats per minute is quite a rapid heart beat, if you’ve ever felt your heart pound in anxiety, just triple that at least once!
Not having to live in fear, of this…is more of a relief than I even realized. I had no idea how much this bothered me, until my doctor told me this was an option for me….when he asked if I would like this done and we did some test, we agreed this is a really great option. I walked out of his office with such relief, such a sense of freedom!

Here is a link that briefly explains this….

http://www.hrsonline.org/PatientInfo/Treatments/CathAbl/index.cfm

Most of my upcoming shows for the few days after or so, will likely be canceled, as I am told to take it easy…singing…as relaxing as it is…well you know how LOUD I can be sometimeS! I guess I better learn to be a bit hushed….
Keep me in your thoughts, somehow, someway…
Thank you for taking the time to read this….
The reason I’m posting it, is 1. It could easily help someone else!!! and 2. Because if someone I knew was going to get this done, I’d want to know what it was, haaa!

Peace!!!

Gloria’s Wings

Every day Gloria woke up and looked at herself in the bathroom mirror, taking notice of anything new that might have occurred while she slept, or at least she would try to sleep.  She took notice of the new feathers in her wings, and the ones that had fallen to the floor, and the lovely dances of the crows as they fluttered their wings against the edges of her eyes.  Every day Gloria awoke with a new sense of the day, new goals in her world, new things to work at achieving. Every day Gloria fell down, skinned her knees, tried to fly, stumbled and jogged through the world, kicking over the earth as she did, leaving small swirls of dust behind her.

Today Gloria woke up, going directly for the coffee cup, instead of the mirror. This wasn’t the kind of morning Gloria wanted to take notice of. Every detail would show, every cross would be turned, every line would be burned and etched into her surface and the blackbirds wouldn’t even notice, their wings would be distant, their sound would be haunting.  Etched across the hardwood floor there would be words in the grain of the wood, stained under her bare feet, deeply cut into the wood of what once, was a tree, what once grew in the earth, the way nothing else could, tall and steady, no matter how hard the wind blew.  Gloria’s wings were ruffled and messed, some were missing, the light had burned all hopes of ever getting close to it. The brilliance attracted her like white fluffy moths to a flame, only to find out, the light that lit the darkness was the same one that burned the ability to have the full freedom of flight…falling hard to the dirt on the floor…she had more strength than that, more strength then to give up and lie hopeless. She would just have to walk. It would just take longer….that’s all.  She sipped her coffee and watched the rain fall against the thin window pane, the noise was mesmerizing to her spirit and she fell into a featherless whirlwind.

From now on, this would not be how things would become. From now on, this would be an allowed sickness, only to invade when she had the time to welcome it, and often she did not.  From now on, this isn’t what would take her, but instead what would make her stronger. Gloria had no time to sit and wait for someone to pull her feathers, or hand her a replacement, she could do that herself. Gloria had no time to wait for others to pick up her missing pieces when they fell to the floor, for she could do it so much quicker…if she just put one foot in front of the other, eventually she would jump and eventually she wouldn’t come back down….

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