Sometimes I think I must be the most blessed of patients! I love my doctors. When my Mother died, I got chest pain with grief, and I called my family doctor who recommended Juan Garcia a cardiologist "just to check things out." Dr Garcia’s wife, Pat, was my student at Assumption Academy and she recognized me immediately! It was like old home week at the doctor’s office, talking about how the boys from Belen would hang out under the senior class window and the girls would crowd around the window (was it the third floor?) and giggle at the boys!!!! Well here they are, running a cardiology practice. At that time, my heart was tested and came up A+ and this time, with the secret silent aneurism "found on the CT for pneumonia," my heart came up A+ again. He listened a lot… checked my blood pressure, recommended I stay on blood pressure med given me by the hospital…. need to keep the pressure down as it pushes against the artery walls… He recommended a great new doctor for me… a cardio thoracic surgeon to measure and evaluate the aneurism… Oh don’t you think that didn’t send me into sleepless nights. I think one of the reasons I was a good project manager was that I can think of all the possible outcomes, the best and the worst…. I’ve had some worst like the time we installed the new automatic call distributer at the Miami call center for Eastern Air Lines and the lines weren’t up at 5am… as dawn rose over the building I was at the point of shutting it all down and falling back to the old system when the phones started ringing!!!! But I had to build worst case scenarios like falling back at 5am…. Well this time i spent nights worrying with myself in surgery for this aneurism. It’s close to the heart… so you can imagine the scary issues. So… I met the new cardio surgeon (Niberto Moreno) who looked at the CT scan from Kingman Arizona and showed me my bulgy aorta. It looks like a fat belly sticking out from around the heart… … he said I can wait to clear up the pneumonia and then get a "real" CT in the Miami Cardiac and Vascular Institute… He’s very proud of his machinery (he is the Chief of Cardiothoracic surgery… so it’s good that he is personable and proud of his team and his machinery!). He treated me well; he and his PA spent a lot of time with me and Chuck assuring us that this is not a touch and go, gonna blow any second kind of situation… but we will follow up after we get the next CT. So… I’m to eat well, keep pressure down with medicine, walk and lift no weights… and heal and go back for CT May 7. Thank God for good doctors and thank you for prayers!!!! As an update cousin Laura is OK after shoulder surgery, went to first therapy… I’ll bet that hurt. And continue to pray for sick and suffering. God bless us. Thank God!
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