Another pea I miss...."Donna in Ga " .....

Not answering her personal email is concerning. Have you googled her full name?

She is a teacher....hmmm Now I am worried too

Her name on the old two peas was Donna in GA. I guess I thought it was her name here too but I think it is donna. I checked some of her old posts and pretty sure you are right. I hope she is ok

I am hoping everything is ok! Let us know if you hear anything, OP.

Wow! I just happened to check in tonight to find out I had been missed. scrappintoee, I don't know how I missed your emails. I will check for them in a bit.

I am sorry I disappeared like that. July and August were crazy busy. Mom had hernia surgery at the end of July and I had to go take care of her for a few days. Then school started and that is always busy. This year was crazier than normal because they wouldn't let us into our rooms until a few days before planning. I only had 2 days in my rooms before planning. (I have not only a classroom, but a lab to get ready as well.) School started on Aug 17.

Then things got really serious. At about 3:16 on August 21, I passed out in my classroom right after the kids had left for the day. I woke up under my desk. I was able to get back in my chair and texted my good friend down the hall. She pressed the panic button to get help. The school nurse had already left for the day, but our athletic trainer came to my aid along with every assistant principal. I called my doctor and was told to go to the nearest urgent care. One of the assistant principals drove me there and my dh met us there. The doctor on duty hooked me up to an ekg and saw pretty quickly that something wasn't right. My heartrate was dropping very low. She decided to call an ambulance and have me transported to the hospital. My first ride in an ambulance was pretty underwhelming.

I was checked into the hospital and they immediately started running tests. Since I am such a horrible person to find a vein on, they put in a central line. That thing seriously hurt!

Saturday morning, my dh was in the room with me and I was on the phone with my youngest brother when I passed out again. (It scared my brother half to death!) Fortunately, I was hooked up to all kinds of monitors and nurses and doctors came running. My cardiologist and his assistant were there on my floor doing rounds so they were able to see that something was very wrong on my ekg. He called to arrange for another cardiologist to come see me who specializes in the electrical signals of the heart.

That particular cardiologist has the same last name as my normal cardiologist, but they are not related. He came to see me around 10:00 that night. My dh had already left for the day. I was in my bed talking to cardiologist #2 when I had another passing out episode, but this one was worse. I went into v-fib and had to have CPR done on me and had to be shocked. I came to, surrounded by bunches of people and someone bagging me. I pushed that poor guy away because he was causing me to start to panic. I was very quickly moved to ICU and my poor dh was called back to the hospital. (My first thoughts were that I was glad he was not there to witness all of that because it would have scared him so much.)

My central line had gotten ripped out in all of the chaos, so nurses had to put in a normal IV. I also had to have a catheter because I was now not allowed out of my bed. I had a heart cath on Monday to check for blockages. No blockages! So I then had a pace-maker/defibrillator put in on Tuesday. I was allowed to go home on Thursday. I spent 4 days in ICU and almost a week in the hospital.

I missed 2 weeks and 2 days of school and was not allowed to do a bit of work during that time. My friend who pushed the panic button for me took care of everything. She and the sub would swap back and forth so that my kids would get some instruction during that long period of time. I am very blessed to have such a wonderful friend down the hall from me.

This whole event made me really examine some things in my life. I had not bounced back from the stomach bug I had at the end of May. I felt very run down all summer but just chalked it up to getting old since I turned 50 at the end of May. I should have listened to my body better than that. I have been diagnosed with some form of Long QT syndrome. It doesn't show up in my DNA test as one of the normal ones, but my doctor said I have all of the classic symptoms of Long QT. My regular family doctor wonders if the virus in May did not cause it. I have felt a lot better now that I have the pace-maker/defibrillator. One big downside though, I can no longer take a lot of the allergy meds that I used to take because they can cause heart rhythm issues. Without the allergy meds the vertigo is now back. This is a little scary at times because it feels a lot like how I would feel right as I was passing out those 3 times in August.

I have made a conscious effort to cut back on work and other things that cause me stress. I have really limited my online time and tried to read more. I feel guilty about not working as much as I did in the past, but facing my mortality like that made me realize that I had my priorities seriously out of order. I am so thankful that the doctor at the urgent care was also an ER doc because her sending me to the hospital likely saved my life. On a normal Saturday night I am usually alone on the couch reading and my dh is in his office on his computer. If I had been alone when the v-fib episode happened I may not have made it.

Thank you so much for asking about me. I will check in more frequently now, but will avoid any political threads since I don't need that stress.

I was just going to post that I remember Donna in GA and now there she is!!

Wow - you certainly have been through too much. Happy you are okay and making sure that you are taking care of yourself! Stay healthy.

Hi, I went through pretty much what you did back in 2012. Except my LQTS gene and mutation was found. 

Welcome to my world. Sorry to have to welcome you to my world though. 

sent you a pm

Thank God you got the help you needed!

Glad to hear you're doing better. Thank sounds so scary. God bless you!

Goodness, that is so scary! I'm so glad you checked in and are doing ok. Hugs!

I'm glad you're ok, and how incredibly lucky to have such great friends and co-workers. AND to code right while you're in bed in the hospital with the EP standing right there? That's amazing luck, if you can call any of that "luck" but you know what I mean.

So glad you were in the right place at the right time for that to happen and get treated.

Welcome back. Glad you're on the mend. Keep being gentle to yourself.

How frightening for you and your family! I am glad that you are doing better. Prayers being sent to you.