my heart

just hours after arriving home from a whirlwind international trip, i found myself back at the hospital -- this time in the cardiology department. thanks to my doctor's direct call to the cardiologist, i was easily able to schedule the pre-op procedures he wanted me to have done as soon as i arrived home, and they promised he would get the results the following day, which means i can schedule my surgery as soon as possible.

i had an EKG, which i've had done before... no big deal. it takes all of two minutes to print out the wavy lines that somehow indicate how your heart works once they stick the little thingies all over your body to attach the electrical wires to. the EKG looks for abnormal rhythms in the heart. i also had an echocardiogram, which i don't think i've had done before. that one took a bit longer. it's sort of just a sonogram, with the wand and the gel, but you also have to be hooked up to some of the electrical connections like with the EKG. the doctor asked me to do a lot of different breathing activities while she took about 50 different pictures of my heart. i could see it beating on the screen, and there were a lot of colors overlaid that i think indicated the flow of blood. this procedure obviously looks for physical issues with the heart and with the flow of the blood. it took about 20 minutes or so.

after i wandered around barnes & noble for awhile, i went back for my appointment with the cardiologist, to go over the results. (same day results -- i told you i had superstar service!) the doctor said that the two procedures showed that everything seems to be working fine with my heart, and that there's no reason to worry in terms of the surgery. which is good! but... there's still something up with my heart.

the cardiologist seemed more fascinated with the situation than concerned, so i am not worried. basically he just kept saying that my heartbeat has an irregular sound, and nothing in the echo indicated any reasons for that. in fact, he seemed to think i was misdiagnosed as a kid, when the pediatric cardiology department at the world-renowned hospital in my hometown told my parents that the tricuspid valve of my heart was actually a bicuspid, causing an incomplete seal when it closed and leading to an odd heartbeat. he said that the echo showed that all of my valves are normal and that my heart is contracting normally, but there is still a "strange" sound that he can't explain. so he wants me to have a cardiac MRI so that we can learn more. he specifically instructed the scheduling desk to make sure he was able to be present for the procedure, so it seems like he's really interested in my freak heart. i had to call the hospital in my hometown and request my records... from 1987. crazy.

but in any case, it seems like i'm good to go for the surgery. my ovulation monitor did not much enjoy me traveling to another time zone, and it didn't actually give me a reading this cycle. i'm not sure exactly wen i ovulated... for once i wasn't paying attention! but today is day 22, so i expect to get my period sometime in the next five days or so regardless. that means the surgery will be the end of april or beginning of may. yippee. i emailed my choir director today to tell her that i'm not sure i can continue performing with the group this semester, since our concerts are the first two weeks of may. sucks. but what can you do? in the end, i hope it will all be worth it.