It’s easy for me to forget. To forget that a machine beats every single heart beat for me. That another part of the machine prevents fatal rhythms from causing my heart to stop altogether. I used to be normal.
Then one day I almost fainted in Aaron Brothers. Then I got a pacemaker, and I got better. I started hiking and playing golf again. I actually got to the point where I didn’t think about it all the time. Except every morning and every night when I brush my teeth and I see the ugly caterpillar scar on the left side of my chest. A caterpillar that gets thicker every five years with every new surgery.
I had a second pacemaker because the battery of the first one got used up. I am 100% pacemaker dependent which means that my pacemaker beats every beat for me, not a backup like lots of people have. I have this thing called A/V block, where my A/V node doesn’t work. The scar healed and I got back to living my life, back to being normal. That is, until the BIG ONE.
I imagine people who live in San Francisco don’t get all that freaked out about tremors. I imagine that they happen all the time. But I bet they would have a sixth sense about a real earthquake, about the big one.
One day about two and a half years ago, Rick and I were at the driving range. I had gone through my whole bag starting with my wedges. Rick went to the putting green while I finished up with my driver. We were going to play nine holes. I can’t remember if I hit one drive or two. I know that when the driver hit the ball, my heart exploded. I instantly dropped the club onto the ground. I just let go of it. I collapsed into a chair that was right behind me. I sat there as if I were watching a video of the event. Henry Dean was hitting balls right in front of me. I should call out to him. Ask him to help me. I couldn’t. Time was in limbo. I have no idea how much time passed. It was all really pleasant and I wanted the experience to last forever. But I knew that if I stayed in the chair I would die.
I knew what I was having was no tremor, that I was having a ventricular tachycardia. I have atrial tachycardia all the time and this was different This was the big one. Rick walked up and I told him we needed to go to the emergency room RIGHT NOW. I was hooked up to an EKG machine within 30 seconds of walking in the door and word quickly spread throughout the hospital. Soon my room was full of nurses, interns, residents, physicians. It wasn’t until after they left that I realized what was happening. I was the patient impaled by the fence post,the man with the nail in his sinus, the freak show. I was having sustained VT’s of 230 and I never lost consciousness. I’m a stud that way. I never faint. They were about to shock me with the paddles when my heart converted on its own and my audience went back to work in other parts of the hospital. I had a battery of tests and they concluded I had hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. They put in an internal defibrillator to intercept any future V Tach’s. Being without one is like Russian roulette. When the scars healed, I got on with my life until the V Tachs started again this past Thanksgiving.
On Monday Dr. Doyle said the first thing that has made sense. My diseased heart is getting worse because I’m alive. Because I survived the big one. Because I defied the odds in such dramatic fashion that the entire emergency room staff came to witness it. I had gotten complacent about the miracle that my life is. I’ve been taking it for granted. No more. I will count my blessings with each breath. I’d been given a second chance and I had forgotten all about it. For a while, I thought I was normal.
Just Passing Through 
too not to
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Shana, I'm counting my blessings to- for each of your breaths- bc you are the best. Love you tons!!
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