Gail's Blog

My BIG MEDICAL MESS was about this:  I had my hip replaced in Georgetown Hospital, and they kept me one night, shifting me to I NOVA Fairfax, Telemetry Unit, which was my home hospital. There they found a pulmonary embolism, started pumping me with blood thinners (Heparin, to be specific) and found that my hemoglobin was dropping like a stone. The trick was to thin my blood without driving me into hemorrhagic shock. In spite of their efforts, I fell into it, anyway. INOVA Fairfax they saved my life again. The first time was almost three years ago when they brought me out of cardiogenic shock , something people survive 50% of the time. Both times I was a guest in CICU, or Cardio Intensive Care. The hip was still in "screaming pain", as my friend, Jeanne calls it from experience, but after they allowed me out of bed (I did get really good at bedpans), and I had physical therapy, which is God's gift to all of us, I was finally transferred to a state-of-the-art intensive re

  Don't be Perturbed! Try Physical Therapy I just read this article about perturbation training. It is basically that you train in doing a balancing exercise with unexpected challenges. Without knowing it, I had some of this training when I first joined Gold's Gym, some years ago. My trainer had me stand on a bosu ball, and while I was jogging in place, he would throw a ball to me to catch. It was tough, and I didn't always stay on the ball, but it was a graduate course in balance.  I loved training at the gym, but since my heart transplant in October, 2018, and then hip replacement in July of this year, I have been being a good girl (as I should be), going carefully, slowly. My transplant team forbids gym attendance, because of the virus. Imagining walking into the gym with a KN95 mask and hand sanitize and checking in has been a constant daydream lately. I would walk over to the "guys' side", which is theoretically for everyone, and do my routine.  As it is,

  I am two years, five months out of my heart transplant. My life is far different than it was before. At first I found things to do, driving to have lunch with friends, going to pick up my sweet grandson from child care once a week for a "date". Going to the gym to see my trainer, working hard. Realizing that getting back in shape would be more of a stretch than it was getting there in the first place!  This was pure bliss. Then there was COVID. I could go outside, but couldn't drive anywhere that ended up inside, like the Safeway, Sherwood Hall Library, or to my daughter's house. The only place I went was to the transplant center, and that was a big outing! During that time, I fainted several times, once outside my house. Standing on the driveway, I thought I was at a delightful garden party, until I hit the pavement. A woman was walking past our house. I could see her alarm, then hesitation about coming over to help. She had on a mask, and I didn't. Even when a