Piece of My Heart
When I checked in at the front desk, they put a wristband on my left arm, and from that point on every person I encountered asked me to verify my name and birth date. I got it right every time. A young man asked me to empty my pockets and put everything in a plastic bag, which he placed in a small locker. He gave me a key with the locker number on it, and I stretched the wrist coil over my left hand. It reminded me of something you’d wear at the water park, or at an onsen.
He brought me to a gurney, and drew a curtain around my little private space. He gave me two large plastic bags, one for my shoes and one for the rest of my clothes. He asked me why I was there. “Transesophageal…” I started to say. “T-E-E” he said. “It’s easier to say.” I put on the silly hospital gown, opening in the back, and per his instructions, didn’t bother to try to tie it in the back. The place was freezing, like a morgue. I pulled the flimsy blanket over my legs, and listened to the conversations coming from behind the other curtains.
About thirty minutes later a nurse brushed the curtain aside, and introduced herself. She stuck some adhesive pads to my chest, each one connected to a wire, “for the EKG,” she said, and took my blood pressure. It was a little high. She stuck a needle in my right arm, and injected a vial of what she said was a saline solution to keep me hydrated. “No more needles now,” she said, but there was still a tube going into my arm, which I thought should count for something. She asked another nurse to bring me more blankets, and we chatted a while. She said my doctor was in a meeting, but would be ready to get started soon. She asked me about running. She told me that her husband had bad knees and was getting out of shape. I asked about her exercise routine, and she told me that she likes the elliptical machine, because it is easy on her joints. I told her that running was getting harder, with the heart valve thing and all. She seemed to understand. “You’ve got to get it in when you can, on the days you feel good.” “Amen sister,” I said.
My cardiologist came in. I’d only met him in person once before, a couple of years ago I think. He still looked ridiculously young. Since then, we’d only spoken on the phone. I go in for a test, and he calls me with the results. I email him with questions, he calls me with answers. He went over the procedure that they were about to perform. I didn’t have any questions; I’d seen it done a couple times on the internet. He and the nurse wheeled me in the gurney to another room. I was introduced to another doctor, a mitral valve specialist, and to the technician who would operate the video game console. There were five of us altogether. The nurse fiddled with tubes in my arm, and took my blood pressure again. It was higher still. My doctor sprayed some lidocaine on the back of my throat, and asked me to gargle. He asked if I knew why I was in the hospital. “I’m having a TEE,” I proudly replied, my tongue a little thick. “Do you know what that stands for?” he asked. Dammit. “Trans...esophageal…” I had to pause and gather myself. I knew the answer, but my lips weren’t cooperating. “...Echocardiogram.” They all cheered, the way you would for a toddler who just made a boom-boom in the potty for the first time. The doctor had another vial that he was about to squirt in my throat. “It’s going to be bitter,” he said. “They experimented with a banana flavored version, but everyone decided it was worse than the original.” It was thick and goopy. “Gargle and swallow,” he instructed. Easier said than done.
Afterward I thought that I had been awake for the whole thing, but looking back, I have no memory of them inserting the tube. Then there I was, apparently fully awake, lying on my left side and listening to the conversation among the doctors and the tech. The tube looked like ½” plastic irrigation tubing. The doctor held one end of it, and the business end felt like it was in my stomach. Something was propping my mouth open. He pulled the tube back and forth, and I could feel it moving around inside me. It wasn’t painful, but it wasn’t pleasant. As the doctor jiggled, yanked and twisted, he elicited sounds of approval from the valve specialist and the tech. I wanted to see what they were so excited about, so I tried to sit up and get a better look at the screen. That got everyone’s attention, and they anxiously but gently pushed me back down on the gurney. I focused on their narrative. There was a lot of talk about “P2” and “P3.” There are six leaflets, or sections, to a mitral valve: A1-A3 (A for anterior, or front) and P1-P3 (P for posterior, or back). I got the impression that they were expecting to find a problem with P3, but discovered instead that P2 was the culprit. Or something like that. In any case, they all seemed to be in agreement, which was reassuring.
With a final yank, my doctor removed the tube. He gave me the first good news: the valve was reparable. Having to replace the fraying valve with an artificial one comes with the potential for complications, less encouraging survival stats, and the need to take blood-thinning medication every day forever. Then came more good news: the surgery will be done with a minimally invasive approach. Instead of cracking me open at the sternum, they’ll be able to get in through a relatively small gaping hole in my side. That means less trauma, quicker recovery, and doesn’t necessarily compromise my future as an underwear model.
The next step is a coronary angiogram. I will practice pronouncing it under the influence right away. My doctor explained that he didn’t have any reason to suspect coronary artery blockage, but on the off chance that they find it, it is relatively easy to remove or bypass the blockages while they already have my resting heart in their hands, and the rest of me on a heart-lung machine. (Note to potential cardiac surgery patients who might be reading this: DO NOT google “pump head syndrome.”) Stay tuned for results of the angiogram.
These two look happy. I wonder which one of them is having a tube shoved into his or her heart through a blood vessel in his or her groin?