A lot has happened in 20 months, remarkable things to say the least. Wildly horrible and astounding things, all within the frame of less than 2 years. Because I've been through the wringer, what follows is only a summary of the negative followed by a gushing reminiscence of the positive in future posts.
When I returned from Ecuador in 2014 after failing to summit, I was in a haze trying to make sense of things. I didn't understand what had happened on the mountain. I. Just. Didn't. Understand. I tried to dig as far as I could reach within my soul to try to uncover what had taken place. I walked around in a fog and avoided people I might run into who might ask me about my trip. I was tired, fatigued beyond belief. I returned to work, to the cycle of frustration within my company who refused to honor their sole mission for those in need. I found it even more difficult than usual to work in an arena where there was no internal support to advocate for the neediest clients, whom we were directly charged with assisting. In late February I found myself in a staff meeting and my heart pounding out of my chest. I have anxiety when speaking in front of others, but this was new. I could feel my heart banging so loudly in my chest that I swore the person next to me could hear it too. A whooshing sound grew in my throat. I desperately wanted to get up and leave the meeting but I did not for fear of standing up to leave and passing out. My vision was blurry and as others spoke, I did my best to deflect attention from myself and try to control my heart rate with some deep breathing. Fifteen minutes later, the palpitations began to lessen, but I'm not sure why. Three hours later, at lunch with a colleague, I described what happened. I was both ashamed that I let my emotions about my job overcome me to such a degree- and worried because I was now gruesomely tired. I went home early and laid on the couch and took a nap. I slept well for a solid hour. As most people know, sleep eludes me and finding sleep was especially comforting on this day. I had a nice dinner with my family and we were all watching TV and reading when I suddenly felt my heart rate double in the course of a few seconds. I wondered to myself if I looked as alarmed as I was feeling and was it possible to pass out even if I was already sitting in a chair? My chest hurt, my arm hurt, and as my vision blurred and my heart pounded, I began to tear up wondering if this was it? Was this the way I would die, in front of my children in the middle of our living room? That's how bad I felt. The more I tried to deny how bad I felt, the more I kept hearing in my head how women deny obvious signs of heart attacks. Was this a heart attack?
I went upstairs to lay down in bed after a few minutes that I thought I felt it ever so slightly subside. I called my husband upstairs and told him what happened and that I feel slightly better but if it happens again in the middle of the night, if I told him to call 911, then he shouldn't ask why, he should just do it.
It happened again after 15 minutes or so and he called 911. We managed to go downstairs and sit in the living room with the kids to tell them what was going to happen when the paramedics arrived-- that it would probably look scary, but they are here to help me and they will probably want me to go to the hospital. If I never see the look on their faces again when the paramedics were there, it will be too soon.
In the ER they kept wanting to chalk it up to stress (don't they always?) and I kept telling them this is beyond a little stress. I asked if maybe I'm having a reaction to the antibiotics I've been on for 10 days, because over the course of the past week and a half I've felt dramatically worse on them, not better. They said, no, probably not possible (!)
What unfolded over the course of the next several months was the continued heartbeat doubling, the feeling of blacking out, even when I was just sitting down. It always came at a time I was doing nothing or feeling quite good during the day. The medication they gave me in the ER dropped my BP so it made me feel generally awful and so now I had 2 unwelcome issues, not just one. Each time I had this heart rate issue, it was followed by nausea and a severe wasting period. I have not known what fatigue truly is until this happened. I eventually had to stop working temporarily because I could not drive because of the near fainting spells. It was decided that the resignation I'd been contemplating for over a year was now indeed something that should take place. I spent the morning of my son's 11th birthday party in March crying in my kitchen that a month ago I was in the best shape of my life, standing at 17,000 feet, and yet here I was, barely able to stand for 10 minutes frosting cupcakes without passing out.
The next several months continued the cardiac testing. Everything was coming out normal, which the cardiologists were thrilled about, noting that Supra Ventricular Tachycardia with absence of underlying pathology is a good thing, "Very alarming and extremely uncomfortable, but you wont drop over dead with a massive cardiac event".
I was nervous that heart issues could possibly preclude one from mountaineering and I took up reading every article possible on cardiac management at high altitude. As luck would have it, a friend's brother who is a physician knew just the cardiologist I should see for an expert evaluation, and even got me an appointment that same week. He referred me to the electrophysiologist in his office who implanted a Linq Reveal cardiac monitor that had recently been approved by the FDA to capture what may be an arrhythmia. Basically all signs pointed to it but they have not captured it yet. The interventional cardiologist said the most magical words to me " I believe you. Your symptoms are real".
Fast forward a few months....I'll gloss over the parts about nearly bleeding out during implanting the device, the insurance issues that nearly bankrupted us, and the deconditioned state that my body was in. Most importantly however, I had a renewed appreciation for small things in life, still remembering vividly the feeling that I was going to die, in my house, with my kids watching. I still cry thinking about that night.
As the months unfolded into the summer, I began to feel stronger, began to understand the subtle feelings that precede an event with my heart. I understand now that what I experienced in January 2014 on Cotopaxi was most likely this problem rearing its head. What I thought of back then as one of the most difficult and disappointing things I'd experienced in my life, quite possibly may have been the thing that saved my life.
In June 2014 we headed to Colorado for a friend's wedding and a week's vacation in Rocky Mountain National Park, the first time I would experience altitude since Ecuador. On some days I felt weak but my heart was OK until the evening. The medication would ease it back with in an hour and I would be relieved. We completed nearly 50 miles of hiking that week, mostly about 9,000', topping out around 12,000'. It gave me my courage back.
In August 2014 I started working for a new company and by November, I had already decided that I would try Cotopaxi again in 2015 if my family approved and if I could attempt it 1:1 with a guide, not a group. I contacted the only guide I knew, who saw what happened last year, who could bring out the best I had in me if I wanted to try again. The problem was, he had only one opening in his schedule and it was far sooner than I thought I'd be ready.
