Playing Doctor

More meaningless posts here...

In my frenzy of getting ready to leave for the conference last week, and the subsequent return, I never filled you all in on the results of all my tests.

The blood work was all fairly normal, although I am doing some research, since some of my "normal results" seem to be on the border of normal. Seems to me if you border on normal in enough categories, the end result is abnormality. (chew on that!)

My echocardiogram, however, was not normal. The echo showed evidence of prolapse of the mitral valve, and the "color doppler" shows tricuspid regurtitation. The doctor didn't really explain too much about what those things mean, but did refer me back to the cardiologist.

In the meantime, me and google did a little footwork. After all, when someone tells you your heart is regurgitating, you can't imagine that that is something good. And of course, you all know how much I love to pretend I know what I am doing when it comes to medicine and the like. (Ahhh...yes, who can forget the vicodin pukes of aught 5)

So first off, what is this pukey heart business? Evidently, not much. It might cause me some fatigue, but everything else about it was rather vague. Lots of "this could mean something serious" or "it's really nothing at all".

Thanks.

On to the prolapse. This proved to be more interesting. For example, some doctors (those who appreciate the value of natural medicine in addition to traditional) seem to belive that the mitral valve prolapse can be an indicator of other issues. I took a look at the list of symptoms these types of people posses and attempted to match it up with problems I have had of late:

~ Migraine headaches - ummmm...yes.
~ Dizzy, spacy feeling - often, sometimes when I am just sitting doing nothing
~ Difficulty concentrating - this was not an issue when I was younger, but it does happen here and there now
~ Balance problems, vertigo - Did I ever tell you about the time I fell down a driveway and tore up my knees?
~ Insomnia, sleep disturbances - If I am not taking my amitryptiline, I am the world's worst sleeper
~ Hyperventilation; shortness of breath - when I get nervous this happens
~ Palpitations of the heart; skipped or irregular heart beat - yup
~ Panic attacks, with pounding heart beat - I hide them well, but yes, I sometimes freak out. I have only had one really bad one so far. I had to leave the building I was in and stand outside in tears, shaking.
~ Phantom chest pain with no apparent physiological cause - I have had this one for FOREVER. My brother would always make fun of me and imitate that old lady from those Life Alert commercials.
~ Hypersensitive startle reflex - Does the fact that I constantly get the life scared out of me by people I live with count?
~ Cold sweats - Yep again.
~ Cold hands and feet - All. the. time.
~ Numbness or tingling in the fingers or toes - Yes. Once after I hung drywall I couldn't feel my fingertips for several weeks
~ Sensitivity to drugs, including alcohol, caffeine, and medications - Any meds I take affect me way more than the average person. I am a "cadbury" when it comes to alcohol, and when I drink caffeine, I occasionally get the shakes. (shakes of joy when its coming from coffee!)

As you can see, I am a textbook case of this stuff, if there actually was a textbook that recognizes this disorder of sorts. You can also see that I sound like I am about 50 years older than I am.

Evidently my body is somehow wired wrong. Where normal people's catecholamines (like epinepherine and adrenaline) only show up when the body needs them, my body likes to pump them way more than I need them. This results in a sort of hyper/exhausted state (I always called it "slap-happy"...who knew there was an actual reason for my behavior?).

The nice thing is that there are things I can do to get better. Wouldn't you know that one of them is exercise? So guess who is going back to the gym? ("Wow, Amber, your blog is so totally cyclical...cool.")

Next post: The quest for gym that isn't too ghetto, and isn't too pretty

Currently Listening to: Brad Roberts of Crash Test Dummies fame covering Hit Me Baby, One More Time
Current Mood: slap-happy (perhaps I should not have had that coke....)