Bart Heart Story

Bart Heart Story

Since Forever:

I hate running. I've always done power, short sports. Running has always made me feel like crap. Cricket, SCA, Volleyball - power burst rather than sustained constant effort.

2017-2019

After heavy effort such as a day of SCA armoured combat, or a day in the armoury hammering heavily, I would get very cold and my heart would pound. Sometimes when fighting, people told me I looked like crap. Something was happening...

2019-2020

I go through a good gp, the a cardiologist, then a surgical cardiologist. It is determined that I have SVT. Short version: The electricals in my heart are doing odd things. More detail: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supraventricular_tachycardia

Tuesday 19th May 2020

I go to have a heart study and ablation. Short Version: An instrument goes in my groin and through to my heart and detects the problems (the study), and then burns the heart muscle in such a way that the electrical fault is cured (the ablation) . More detail: https://www.melbourneheartrhythm.com.au/learn/procedures/11-supraventricular-tachycardia-ablation

This does not work this time under twilight. When they induce the problem, it does not behave as it should, and the choice was made to not ablate because everything was too unusual. It was suspected that this was due to the twilight. My surgery was also very late at night, due to being one of the first elective surgeries post COVID-19 lockdowns being lifted. Sleeping afterwards was tough as I received a nasty burn from the heart zap pads.

I recover from the process quite nicely. I am put onto Betaloc, which is a beta blocker. This tablet makes me dimmer intellectually and nauseous. I had to pull back from multiple commitments such as not re-running for the ANCA president.

Tuesday 22nd June 2020

I am due to have another heart study and ablation. I am washed, shaved up and ready - and it is cancelled due to a problem with the machine.

Tuesday 14th July 2020 - I have another heart study and four ablations. The study finds an atrial flutter, AVNRT, and two SVT. They are all radio ablated. I am on the table for six hours. This is much more than was expected, but after two previous sessions the doctor decided to get everything done at once. I am now on Eliquis Apixaban (blood thinner) and Pantoprazole Sandoz (reflux prevention) and painkillers.

So what did this FEEL like?

After sitting around bored in the gown, I got wheeled down to surgery around 12. There they explain that due to the failure to map properly last time, I will only have local on my groin, and no twilight. I'm going to be awake for most of this, hooray... The groin is drugged and the instruments are put in. This time I am positioned slightly differently so I can't see the big monitors that show the action.

The study begins, which is where they chemically induce a fast heart rate to cause the problem, so they understand how to fix it. This is like chemically running a marathon - your heart rate is jacked up and you feel like you are straining hard. I start breathing hard. The doctor then says that my breaths are too big, and that they interfere with his instruments. I'm going to have to run a marathon on tiny breaths. This is EXHAUSTING. I develop a mantra to shorten my breathes, which is "Aus-trali-A, The AC-T" with an up on the A, and a down on the T. I don't know how long this goes on, maybe an hour? Where the doctor keeps finding more and more issues. They expected one issue and one ablation, but during the study they find a flutter, and AVNRT, and two SVTs.

Eventually they begin the first ablation which was fixing the flutter. This is excruciating, and feels like my ribcage is being pulled apart by a carjack. My life has been full of sport and adventures in silly, painful things, so I know many of the very bad types of pain. This one was the slow pulling apart of ligaments and tendons, and you know they are close to just bursting apart. The main agony was focused just above my right rotator cuff. I believe I broke that bone once, so I suspect that it is the weak point of my whole rib cage, so it reported in as the part most likely to tear apart first. My whole rib cage was yelling very angrily at me, but the right shoulder felt ready to tear apart.

I had been doing to short breathing for an hour, so I told the doc I needed to breathe big when I could to take this pain. He told me when I could breathe big, then he told me when he was working and I had to stay on shallow breathes. I would have been crying heavily at this point, but there was no liquid to let go, so I was salt crying, which as you know stings pretty badly. At this point I think they realised how badly I was doing here, and I was told I was going under general, and the other ablations would be done with out me being awake. I got told to suck in big breaths of the gas, and I was soon blessedly out.

When I came back with the program, I was in my room, it was around 7pm and Tig was next to me. My ribcage hurt like blazes, feeling like I was recovering from my ribcage being jacked apart. I had been intubated (tubes down my throat) which feels nasty. I was actually more comfortable than last time as I could semi-rest as I did not have the burn on my back this time. My main discomfort was actually that I needed to go for a #2. There was an attempt to organise a bedpan, but that didn't work. As it was I drifted in and out of sleep listening to TFL YouTubes.

Wednesday 15th July 2020 -I was finally allowed to be mostly unplugged and go to the toilet. Blessed relief!

I kept rotating between listening to TFL YouTubes and sleeping and tripping out from all the drugs I was on. I was having all sorts of visual illusions and weird visions. I knew they were hallucinations  and waking dreams because I could turn them off by opening my eyes and breathing deeply.

Over the day I was gradually unplugged from all the things, and observations stopped. I was offered painkillers, but only went as far as Panadol. I didn't need Endone this time as I was sleeping okay over the ache. Last time I had more hardcore drugs due to sleep being an impossibility due to the burn.

During the day I was okay, trippy due to the drugs, napping, and tired, but okay. Doc came late, and we had a chat, and I was okay to go home. I get unplugged from all the toys, got dressed, got drugs, and went home. I chilled on the couch while we watched a little bit of DC Legends of Tomorrow, and then we set up the bed and I went to sleep around 8pm.

Thursday 16th July 2020 - I ache in my ribs and throat, I am still woozy AF, but I can paint tokens, I fed the dogs this morning, and I fed myself lunch. I am nicely on the mend. I am compis mentis enough to write this missive at 4pm. I think the recover will be much slower this time due to my rib tendon and ligament stetching, let alone my heart actually being spot welded, but I am confident that in a few months I will be better that ever.

I'm quite curious to see if running becomes actually fun, and if SVT was the reason I have always loathed it!