The Heart is a Lonely Hurter, Part Two

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My health insurance administrator is kind enough to send me periodic updates on the amounts they've paid out to doctors, hospitals, ambulance services, and lab tests. It's more than a little scary to contemplate the total financial burden I've placed on my brother (and sister) members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, who in effect self-pay into our own insurance plan. More than a hundred grand, easy, and I'm not out of the woods yet. My only solace is the 35 years I've contributed to the fund with sicks days you could count on one hand.

It wasn't supposed to happen. Me, the solid oak...I could outwork the youngsters easily (and did). Many were the evenings, at the dead ends of twelve hour days and 70 plus hour weeks, when I and a handful of others were the only ones left manning a job. When it counted...when it had to be finished. Endurance is everything.

That's was my reputation: reliability and competence. It meant a lot to me. A hell of a lot.

3/7/09 midnight

A whirlwind week is ending. A unrecognized heart attack on Monday, hospitalization Tuesday night, and two stents implanted in the wee hours of Wednesday morning. A day of recuperation and release from the hospital by Friday. There is surprisingly little pain, mainly at night when I try to sleep. (My wife has set up a bed downstairs so I don't have to climb the stairs)

I'm profoundly grateful (that doesn't even begin to express it) to my wife for the way she has held up. Two wrecks at the same time doesn't cut it, not with a teenager in the house. But I know just how shaken up the last week has left her.

It's a cool still night, and I stand outside looking at the stars...all six of them. Hooray for civilization and light pollution. I remember summer nights at my grandmother's house - millions of crystal stars and the brilliant white smudge of the Milky Way splashed from horizon to horizon.

Suddenly, from nowhere, there are tears running down my face. Dude. Stop this. What the...remember Edmund Muskie. Glad no one is seeing this.

A few words about stents:

A stent is a spring-like medical device designed to be placed in artery to keep it open (See illustration above). The newer and more advanced stents have a drug-eluting coating that help prevents "restenosis," the return of clots and scar tissue that choke off blood flow. I have a total of four: the two implanted immediately after my heart attack plus two more implanted during a scheduled procedure 3 weeks later.

4/16/09

A dragging sense of limbo seems to have overtaken my life. It's been six weeks and my direction is more confused than ever. Our one income family status is slowly dragging us down, despite a small (temporary) disability stipend from our insurance. I'm trying to fast track my doctors into clearing me to return to work, but there are complications.

Dr. B, while implanting the second set of stents, saw something about my ventricular function he didn't like. He told my wife Sandy that the ejection fraction was too low, and the danger of heart arrhythmias worried him. An implanted debrillator could be an eventual solution, but he wanted a further test to get a more accurate picture of Rick's ventricular function.

Enter the MUGA!

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