Dateline: Thursday, October 24, 2024

Last Saturday, I went to the ER due extreme difficulty breathing under even mild exertion. I had gone to the ER for the same thing on Thursday, but they sent me home. On Saturday, it was much worse. This time they re-did the test from Thursday (a chest x-ray), did a CT scan, and admitted me. In the middle of the night, they did an echo cardiogram and determined my pericardium, the sac around the heart, had filled with fluid, making it hard for the heart to beat, making it hard for me to breathe.

On Sunday, I underwent moderately invasive surgery to remove the fluid, also putting in a drain tube. They then watched me several days and measured the continued drainage. In all, they pulled 1070 cc of bloody fluid from my pericardium. That’s a fair amount.

An echo cardiogram yesterday morning showed the sac to be clear of fluid, so I was released in the afternoon after a long session with my cardiologist. I’ve been on blood thinners ever since my first stroke in January, and on stronger thinners since my stroke in September. He is concerned about the risk of continued bleeding. So I’m now off blood thinners until a repeat echo cardiogram next week shows no accumulation of new fluid. After that, I may go back on a mild blood thinner.

So what does this all mean going forward? Today I’ll spend some time looking at where my different writing projects stand, and make some plans for the next couple of weeks. One thing that will happen is I will (well, our son and his husband will) move my workstation upstairs, out of The Dungeon. Working in a new space will take some getting used to—although I’ve done that before