better news

We were advised to call in after 1 pm on Monday after earlier scheduling put the procedure at 9 am. We did and were told to be in hospital by 2 pm. By 3 we were all checked and by 4 I was on the table.

Several surprises along the way: first, I had converted back to a normal sinus rhythm sometime over the weekend. I could not tell, but probably it was concurrent with my HR returning to normal. Just a guess. Second, what I assumed as a conscious process that would take a few minutes was not. The procedure was described as 3-4 hours! With general anesthetic. Also I found out what kills the rock stars on over medication with the new pain killers: there is no warning. It seemed to me in the past that you could feel yourself going nighty-night and maybe get a joke or two in.  In this one, I asked the anesthesiologist if he had started and he said 2 minutes, then I was gone! Lights out immediately. No chance to say, I need to take an antidote for this. Don't mess with the fentanol family. Also, the procedure required three pokes--two groin, one each side, and one neck. When I had some similar studies done some 27 years ago, it was one poke. They also catheterized me because the procedure required plenty of water in the tools. I am getting tired of being catheterized! So quite a few things were different this time out. The surgical staff had a collective laugh about the crudity of procedures back in the day compared to the current state of the art.

My procedure lasted about 3 hours. I was back in recovery before I was conscious and don't remember the doc talking to Lisa and Jan. I found out later that he said it went well and they had blasted an area that was producing atrial flutter and an other one that was producing a-fib. I didn't know that they differentiated these two conditions. (They had described my Friday experience as atrial flutter; perhaps that was why I was able to recover normal sinus rhythm on my own?) The next day I asked about size of the blast and he said millimeters. He also is not worried about diet or exercise; I can start cardiac rehab right away. (I think I'll give it a few days,) No heavy lifting, but that was about all.

I feel pretty darn good, better than when they had got my heart back to an ejection fraction of 50+. My appetite is finally returning, making my quest to maintain my current weight of 220 more challenging. But we are determined to go low salt/sodium and count calories, and measure water intake.

So while this seems like an end, there is the matter of the heart doing its own thing. Many of these ablations take two runs when another (missed? unseen?) path shows up months or even years down the road. A friend who lives down the road in our neighborhood was out chopping weeds when I called on Friday. He had to go back for a second. The second ablation was much more successful. But my doc said he was optimistic. But who knows, he may always be optimistic.

Cautiously, it may now be time to really heal....

Thanks to all of you who follow/lurk on this blog for your best wishes. They are highly valued.