Cardiac Rehab - Setback

Six Weeks and some change

Dec 6th 2018 seems so far away now. But yesterday January 22nd I visited the Heart Institute for the first time since leaving after my Ablation. However, mother nature stymied me and it was a Polar Vortex the past three days so that meant traffic was a lot slower in addition to black ice and of course the usual winter long drives. I even gave myself extra time and it still took a lot longer to get to the destination. Long story short I pulled up to the meter parking and if you've used the PayByPhone app I punched in the 5 digit number and maxed out my visit and away I went. I was only a couple of minutes late.

Rewind to around January 13th when I registered my last run for the Lululemon 40/80 challenge and sadly ended my RORunStreak, but I did manage to log in just over 40 K for the Lulu challenge which meant a nice discount for the girls!

However since I started back running and HIIT training my HR has been spiking higher than normal

Now back to the Cardiac Rehab centre. I met with Roxanne, a physiotherapist, who asked me A LOT of questions and basically my fitness activities. So here is pretty much the laundry list of what I do.

• running
• HIIT training a la OrangeTheory Fitness (run, row, body weights)
• snowshoeing
• trail running
• snowboarding
• cycling
• skating

Given that I used to train almost 5-6 times a week I was getting about 2-4 times, but of course with the RORunStreak I was trying to get back to where I left off prior to the diagnosis.

So in addition to the in person questions I answered a questionnaire online prior to my appointment and we went over that as well. Apparently that one was about stress and depression. Of course I didn't realize those questions were being scored! 😨

Here's the bottom line--my scores indicated stress and depression!

My reaction was mixed. Part of me was stunned and the other part of me was anxious! It was like a flood of emotions that it was happening again. The palpitations, racing heart, crack in my voice. 

So now what?

Roxanne informed me that the Cardiac Rehab centre is not just for getting you back to a more healthy lifestyle. They have a variety of programs:

• Nutrition counselling
• Stress management
• Smoking cessation
• Vocational counselling
• Psychological counselling
• Social work counselling

I was quite surprised and apparently I'm covered by this if I so choose. We talked a lot for more than an hour on options, but ultimately this is my plan of action.

I will beginning a Brief Program, but before any of that I need some bloodwork done and in addition to that I have my sleep study report to follow up with. That will most likely be in a future post.

Once I get the blood work done then my next step is another Fitness Stress Test. 

Roxanne wants to measure my fitness level at just a walk and see how my heart handles the exercise. After all it is a test of my fitness. Keep in mind the last couple of weeks my heart rate has been abnormally high and has not been able to come down. So we will see.

Next will be a follow up appointment with a new PT names Guy-Anne and then we'll see from my test results what I should be doing.

Once I get onto the program then I will have a follow up several weeks on my progress. However, before I could leave the rehab centre I had to have all my vitals taken and after Roxanne showed me how to check my pulse/heart rate and to recognize that my heart is skipping a beat. So after Roxanne consulted with a nurse they decided that I should get an ECG just to make sure that everything is going according to my EP's plan. I just have to remind myself that the healing could take as long as three months or more before my heart figures it out.

So I took my lovely requisistion and went around the corner to another waiting room and waited for my turn for the ECG.

SVP

I had about 35 minutes left on my meter and as I checked I was given number 64. Guess what number they called when I got there for ECG. 48!😧 I waited and when they got to like 54 I ducked out and fed the meter as the time was ticking! Of course time ran out again, BUT my number was called. So now what?? I rolled the dice again as I always do when I come to this place and the gamble paid off as |I got my ECG and rushed it back to the rehab centre and gave it to the admin and went on my way. I left there pretty much three hours later and not really the answers I was hoping, but more of a reality check that I'm not quite ready. I messaged the usual crew Kiera and of course work my results and I was offered by Therese to help me read my ECG or at least interpret to me what all those waves really mean as Normal has been a long way since my Ablation. I did learn about the alphabet. P QRS and T. It seems one of those letters seems to be missing in my ECG. What does that mean, well according to Therese my heart seems to be trying to work around the Ablation which may be trying to go the opposite direction that the electrical charge wants to go. So for those that haven't been following along AFib basically means that my electrical system in my heart isn't working or more that it's overworking/stimulating my heart; hence the high heart rate as of late. Of course the EP will need to verify so I went online to my ottawa heart page to see if there was anything on my ECG or a report, but nothing, but did find other interesting diagnostic reports and my operative summary. Very cool to read these. I didn't understand a lot of the lingo, but it was all medical jargon.

So for the moment I have been fasting and await with probably my elders aka other seniors for the line up to get blood drawn for my blood test.

Oh joy! In the meantime I now just relax and take it easy!😒