While I may seem immortal and indestructible, that is apparently not the case. Back in August, I had an a-fib incident which was uncomfortable but not life threatening. As a result, I started seeing a cardiologist to make sure everything was in good shape. In the process of doing all of his testing, he determined that the valve in my aorta has a genetic flaw which needs to be fixed. Trust me - it sounds much worse than it actually is. The "fix" is a procedure kind of like an angiogram where they insert a replacement valve on top of the original valve. The procedure is called TAVR and is incredibly safe - for heart surgery, anyway. I'm sure that many of the posters here have had heart issues where they had stents inserted - this is just like a big stent.
The alternative is full-blown open heart surgery to replace the valve after opening your chest, heart/lung machine, etc - not a pretty picture. My condition is considered "low risk" at the moment, which means that it needs to be addressed, but not to the extent of opening me up like something at KFC. It's been like that my whole life, so I'm not concerned in the least.
Why did I post this? - other than for mass quantities of sympathy?
One of the things that you have to do to prepare for this is take care of any dental issues that have been delayed. This is due to the chance that dental infections can cause heart issues. Just in case that there was any question about my heritage (Irish / English and their terrible history of incredibly bad teeth), my mouth has been an area of concern for many years. I got everything else handled over the past few weeks, but there were several teeth that were way past the point of hope and had to be extracted. I had those extractions done today - just in time for Thanksgiving! Nothing says giving thanks like subsisting on mashed potatoes during this holiday season!
So, to conclude, I am sitting here - starving and in OMG pain. Just hoping that my new tooth-less condition doesn't mean that I am relegated to a white trash / trailer park existence until I end up on Cops or Live PD...
The alternative is full-blown open heart surgery to replace the valve after opening your chest, heart/lung machine, etc - not a pretty picture. My condition is considered "low risk" at the moment, which means that it needs to be addressed, but not to the extent of opening me up like something at KFC. It's been like that my whole life, so I'm not concerned in the least.
Why did I post this? - other than for mass quantities of sympathy?
One of the things that you have to do to prepare for this is take care of any dental issues that have been delayed. This is due to the chance that dental infections can cause heart issues. Just in case that there was any question about my heritage (Irish / English and their terrible history of incredibly bad teeth), my mouth has been an area of concern for many years. I got everything else handled over the past few weeks, but there were several teeth that were way past the point of hope and had to be extracted. I had those extractions done today - just in time for Thanksgiving! Nothing says giving thanks like subsisting on mashed potatoes during this holiday season!
So, to conclude, I am sitting here - starving and in OMG pain. Just hoping that my new tooth-less condition doesn't mean that I am relegated to a white trash / trailer park existence until I end up on Cops or Live PD...
