1. Outstanding Medical News
On Tuesday, I saw my cardiologist for the follow-up after my cardiac catheterization last month. He told me that he thinks it's not true that I have a 50% blockage in one artery. He showed me the films that were taken of my procedure. He pointed out what the other cardiologist had thought was a blockage, and showed me that nothing was being "blocked" -- the blood was flowing through the artery completely normally. He thinks the "blockage" is actually something called a myocardial bridge, where a bit of the artery grows into the heart muscle and then out again. These are usually harmless. Sometimes they can cause chest pain, and there are treatments available. But basically I do not show the slightest sign of any plaque. My arteries appear to be completely clear. "How old are you?" he asked. "61? Given how your arteries look now, I don't think there's any chance you're going to have trouble with heart disease in the future."
"You do not have coronary artery disease."
Then he apologized for having put me through all this -- but my gosh, there was nothing to apologize for. How many people, at age 61, are given a clean bill of health like that? I now know that I'm almost certainly not going to die of heart disease, unless I develop congestive heart failure later on, which could happen to anybody. But I'm not going to have a heart attack caused by blocked arteries. Throughout this process, the multiple stress tests, people have kept telling me that my heart looks good, sounds good, beats strongly, all of that. And now I know that I have no plaque.
There are a lot of other things one can die from. And one or more of them will eventually take me down. But it isn't going to be coronary artery disease.
Maybe it will be covid (see below).
On Wednesday, there was a ceremony at the kids' school where Teen B was scheduled to receive an award from one of his teachers. Wednesday is late start day (school starts at 9:45 instead of 8:45), so they held the ceremony before classes, at 8:30. But before that, Rocket Boy needed to take his car to the shop and Teen B and I needed to pick him up there. We left our house at 7:45. Rocket Boy drove his car to the garage, and Teen B and I drove to -- a different garage, where he takes his other car, because that's where I thought he was going. I actually drove PAST that shop and had to go around the block. We finally drove up to the shop and parked, but there was no sign of Rocket Boy, even though he'd left home first.
So I called him. No answer. Then he called back -- "Where are you?" "I'm at Paul's," I said (Paul is the owner of the garage). "No, you're not, I'm at Paul's," Rocket Boy said. After a certain amount of arguing, we determined that I was in the wrong place and that I needed to be a few miles further east on Arapahoe, at Paul's new shop, where I've never been. So, Teen B and I drove there and picked up Rocket Boy.
But then we had to get to the middle school. I knew there was construction at one end of the street it's on, so I went a different way -- Rocket Boy told me not to go that way -- I followed his instructions instead of what I knew was right...
Let's just say, it was a good thing I'd allowed lots of extra time. Rocket Boy was properly apologetic for misdirecting me, and he used his phone to find me another route. We were in our seats at the middle school auditorium by 8:20, plenty of time. Whew.
(I should perhaps note that the night before
I had a dream where I was so busy playing computer solitaire that I
forgot to go to the awards ceremony. So I was
clearly anxious about something going wrong. Just the wrong something.)
We didn't know ahead of time why Teen B had been chosen for an award, nor which teacher had chosen him, and we'd been trying to guess -- his math teacher? his music teacher? We were wrong -- it was his science teacher, and the award was for "figuring out my system and getting perfect grades on tests." What was slightly mysterious about this was that we'd had a meeting with this same teacher a month or two previously about Teen A, and the teacher had praised Teen A for the same thing he was now praising Teen B for. We wondered whether he'd gotten the boys mixed up. It hasn't happened in a while, but it used to when they were younger.
After the award ceremony we stood around with 100 or so other parents and kids, chatting, until it occurred to both of us that maybe we didn't want to be around so many other people when covid is spreading like wildfire. So we went outside and then home.
Thursday morning, after the twins had gone to school, Rocket Boy told me that he wasn't feeling well, that he had a cold. "I'm going to get a covid test," he told me. So that afternoon, after his online conference ended, I drove him out to Stazio for a test. I was already feeling a little weird myself and probably should have gotten tested too, but I skipped it. We drove home again -- it was terribly windy -- and then I had to drive to the kids' school to pick up Teen B, after which I drove him to his orthodontia appointment. An hour later I drove Rocket Boy out to east Arapahoe to pick up his car from the shop, and after dinner I drove to Trader Joe's to stock up. After which, I admitted that I was definitely sick too, this sort of weird swirling feeling running through my body. And Teen B wasn't feeling great either.
Teen B stayed home from school Friday, and I cancelled my appointment to get my hair cut. Around 10:30, he and I drove out to Stazio for our own tests, even though I was feeling like crap and probably shouldn't have been driving. We went home to rest, at which point the light rain that had been falling all morning started to change to snow. I had planted three containers full of flowers two days before -- purple flowers in one, pink snapdragons and fuchsias in another, and yellow marigolds and a cherry tomato plant in a third. "They're all going to freeze!" We put plastic over the marigold pot, and later more over the others. But I couldn't do anything about the irises that were blooming, or the onions, or our late lilac that was just coming into bud.
I don't know how much snow we got -- for some reason they haven't posted snowfall totals on the weather service website. I saw one report that estimated 6 inches. It could have been that. It was such heavy, wet snow, that it seems like it would be hard to measure. But it's melting fast. And how wonderful to have all that moisture. I read that we got 1.2 inches (converting the snow into rain). And more rain is due this coming week.
Oh, and on either Friday or Saturday -- can't remember now -- we were sitting in the desk room and I suddenly saw a male Western Tanager on the lilac bush! If you don't know what a Western Tanager looks like, google it, because it is one of the prettiest birds in north America. And I've certainly never seen one in my yard! I think the snowstorm blew a lot of birds off course.
Saturday we all felt awful. I slept late, and Rocket Boy fed the cats. "If this isn't covid, it must be the flu," I said. I was congested and kept coughing and sneezing. My temperature was 99.5 (it's normally around 97). Teen B and Rocket Boy had headaches. We all had occasional chills and body aches. I couldn't concentrate enough to read. Rocket Boy kept checking the website for Mako Medical, the testing company, but it just showed his results from the last time he was tested there, back in 2021. Finally he got a message from some app that tells you whether you've been in contact with anyone who has covid. It said, "Would you like to share your positive test result with the public?" He did, and soon I got a message from the app telling me I'd been in contact with someone who tested positive. Sigh.
This morning Teen A's results came through (he was tested at school on Friday). Positive -- first time we've ever seen that result from the school testing, and he's been tested every week for the past year. Then I got the same notice Rocket Boy got yesterday, about did I want to share my positive result with the public. I said sure. Finally my results and Teen B's showed up on the Mako site. Positive, positive.
I'm wondering if the cats have it too?
Teen A is furious about his positive result. The kickball tournament is tomorrow and he's on a team. "I'm not missing it!" he told me. "I'm going to school!" "No, you're not," I said. Maybe he'll get himself up early tomorrow and run off to the bus without me knowing it. What would I do in that case? Call the school and tell them to pull him out of class?
And of course this coming week is the last week of school and graduation is Thursday. And we all have covid. I'm thinking I could get the boys rapid tests on Tuesday or Wednesday, see if they still register as positive. Teen B probably will, but maybe Teen A won't? if he's had it for a while? I don't know.
I have a feeling Rocket Boy and I are going to miss graduation.
Rocket Boy ended up driving to a Starbucks in Louisville that has a drive through. I had library books that I needed to return and holds to pick up before they expired. He handled that too, even though he really shouldn't have gone inside the building. At least he was quick, wore a mask, and used the self-serve checkout machines. (The librarians will now get that little message on their phones: you may have been exposed to someone with covid!) And I have a prescription refill that I need to pick up. I probably should call the pharmacy and ask how to handle that.
We need food, too. Just out of curiosity, I googled "what to eat when you have covid," and got predictable answers: "Vegetables! Lentils! Stay away from sugar!" It's like, oh, come on. Who wants to eat vegetables when you're sick? And for that matter, who feels up to cooking when you're sick? What we really need (ok, want) are baked goods. Blueberry muffins. A pie. Ice cream and popsicles would be good too. I probably need to find out more about this InstaCart thing that people use.
We got take-out Chinese last night. It was a rather odd order: three noodle dishes, plus sesame tofu. All vegetarian. I often get one chicken dish, but the thought of meat grossed me out. Each of us had a small plateful and then we were done. No one was hungry. So that will probably be dinner for a few more nights, if we can stomach it. Thinking about it doesn't make me feel good.
Also, we're almost out of cold medicine. I took my last dose last night. I guess it's not necessary, just makes you feel a little better. We tried to find out whether we could get those antiviral pills, but Urgent Care refused to dispense them. It's fine. We're probably going to be OK.
But I am really sorry that we'll miss graduation. Just one more goofy thing about the kids' middle school experience.
Update: We didn't miss graduation! More about that next Sunday.
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