Almost Two Years
So much has happened since I had my heart catheterization in March 2021. I’ve shared the incidents leading up to having a heart catheterization and subsequent triple heart bypass before. But now it’s time for me to see my cardiologist for an annual revisit. I don’t recall that I was told to make an appointment to follow up with him, so it’s been almost two years. My family physician casually asked if I had the follow-up and I was embarrassed to tell her that I hadn’t. I made the appointment. It’s now time to face the music. There were a few sour notes since I last saw him.
It will be almost two years to the day when he did the heart catheterization and this appointment. That procedure said that I either needed several stents put into place or I needed bypass surgery. He advised that since I still had a healthy heart (no previous heart attack) that I go for the bypass operation. Because I was a diabetic, the stents would only provide temporary relief and I would eventually need to have them redone. I was shipped directly to the hospital and three days later, I was under the knife.
The hospital ran several tests before they split my sternum to gain access to my heart and the vessels that service it. One thing that they did was shave my hair from my neck to my ankles. I’ve heard of men who voluntarily go to have “man-scaping” done and I don’t understand why they would subject themselves to being scrapped or waxed. Hair itches like crazy when it grows back and being shaved made me feel even more naked when I went to surgery the next day.
I’ll have to share all that’s happened since then. The two things I’m sure he will be worried about are the episodes where I had double vision and the triglyceride lab test being so high. I believe that the two incidents are inter-related. It will be interesting to see what he has to say. I’m sure I will be chastised for not making the “first” annual appointment to see him. There may be fireworks in the month of March. I’ll have to wait and see.