So still trying to work out how this blog thingy works. Do I construct an historical timeline of what happened to me, before, during and after the heart attack in July, 2007? Or do I post about my heart event and intersperse this with things as they happen now on a day to day basis?
Thought about this yesterday whilst doing some exercise and have decided on the latter.
Will post about issues as I recall them taking place and ongoing issues as they occur. I think this is the way to go and more REAL in the sense that it will help illustrate that when you have more than one health issue going on at the same time, 'fixing' one does not necessarily mean that all is hunky-dory.
For example: This morning I get up not feeling 100% - just one of those things that happens with my diabetes and can be the way I start a day once, twice or more times a week. Check my sugars as I do first thing each morning and they are 9 mmol/l (163.64 mg/dl) which is not fantastic but not all that bad given I don't sleep all that well which I now know impacts on my sugars.
I get on with it, have a yogurt and coffee after having earlier taken a shot of both
Byetta and
Lantus insulin for my diabetes which I do every morning before starting my day. I feel better, check what's happening on the internet and then get to preparing the food for our birds a daily routine which I have been doing on my own while Evelyn has been away this past week.
I take out Gilly (a long bill corella we adopted in 2008) from his room in our house where he spends nights and put him on the patio with the food I have prepared for all of our birds (and even wild birds like this king parrot who wasn't about to wait to be fed!).
This is a photo I took a few days ago. Gilly will sit in his cage watching me feed our other adopted birds and wildlife visitors before I put him into his aviary for the day.
Whilst feeding and watering our birds I start to feel unwell again - headache, bit of nausea, light chest pain and tingling down the left side of my arm/hand. Not uncommon for me, usually happens for no apparent reason like not exerting myself or exercising and been told a while ago I have
unstable angina. More often than not, this can happen when I am sitting at my desk at my computer, however, this morning started soon after I got up from bed, improved then got worse as I was outside doing the birds.
Now when this all started a number of years ago I used to get all anxious and even would panic and would pick up the phone, make an appointment to see my cardiologist which a number of times resulted in my having various tests. Over the years since my heart attack I have had numerous stress tests and will talk more about these in a separate post. Even did a
CT angiogram a couple of years ago which showed my stents were all okay.
Upshot of all this was being diagnosed with
angina and being put on
Duride (Isosorbide Mononitrate) to help manage it. I was also given a
GTN Nitro spray to be used when an angina event occurred and I guess it would be fair to say that over the past few years I have managed my angina with these two meds.
So when I felt unwell again this morning, I took a shot of my GTN spray, sat down for a bit to let it take effect and then went back to finishing up with the birds after feeling better.
I guess if there is a message I wish to share about the above it is one about the need for diabetics to recognize the interrelationship between poor sleep affecting sugar levels which in turn can affect the heart and bring on an angina attack.
Throw in additional issues that can arise for someone who has an endocrinological issue such as a thyroid condition, life can become that much more interesting with the continual battle to balance sugar and thyroid levels whilst managing a heart condition. Did I mention I have (had) Graves Disease? And if you have carotid artery blockages we are really getting into interesting territory.
*************************
In May this year (2014) I had what turned out to be a pretty bad angina attack which landed me in hospital for two days and I learnt a lot from this incident about the relationship between sleep, diabetes and angina.
I wrote the following about what happened on my Facebook page:
"On Tuesday, May 13 shortly after lunch I sat down at my desk and began feeling clammy and sweating profusely. I also had a touch of nausea, a queasy feeling and felt light headed but these lasted only a minute or two. In addition I had very slight pressure/ache down both sides of my neck going up to the lower jaw on both sides. I took my GTN spray as I thought this was just another angina attack but the sweating and pressure in my neck did not go away - usually within a few minutes of taking the spray any symptoms I have go away. The week before I had two angina attacks two days in a row, both of which were the worst to date, and my GP said the next time I have an attack to call an ambulance to get it checked out.
Because the sweating and neck ache persisted and given that I have blocked carotids - up to 69% on the right side and up to 54% on the left - I decided that this time I would get this episode checked out and my wife phoned 000 to get an ambulance. On arrival the paramedics checked my blood sugars which came up with 3.8 and they said I may be having a Hypo/low. Now this was strange as just before I had lunch I had checked my blood sugar at 12.30pm and the reading was 5.2 so to be told I was having a Hypo less than two hours after eating a toasted chese and tuna sandwich and not feeling the Hypo symptoms I usually get had me confused.
The paramedics confirmed that I should be taken to hospital to be checked out, especially given the neck issues. They gave a tube of glucose to suck on which I couldn't tolerate so I opted to eat a bunch of my glucose laden jelly beans. En route to the hospital my sugar levels climbed to 6.2 and from memory, by the time I arrived at the hospital it was around 10.
In addition, they gave me four additional shots of GTN en route and by the time we arrived at emergency the ache on the left side had all but gone - the right side ache disappeared earlier after a couple of GTN shots."
From this episode I was reminded about having "silent" hypos at night while sleeping, something I had not thought about a lot.
I wrote more about this in a
NOTE on my Facebook page and also highlighted the need for me (others) to be more vigilant in taking control of our own health, specifically when it comes to
CHECKING OUR NUMBERS including sugar levels/HbA1C, blood pressure, thyroid/TSH levels, iron levels, etc. especially if you are someone like me with a number of issues going on at the same time. From this incident I also learnt about the need for me to address my poor sleep patterns and breathing issues both of which I was told during my hospital visit would be impacting on my heart and affecting my angina.
My final comment in this note was: In summary, this week's events were a more than subtle reminder that I need to be more diligent and attuned to what is going on with my various issues and that to fail to do so could have dire consequences.
Here I am after being brought into hospital in May, 2014.
