Fatal if used as directed
I have survived my first week of torture.
I am a bit surprised at this, as I had never even entered a gym before and have a distaste for any exercise with is non-productive. A brisk walk to the pub is fine. Repeatedly raising a weight [how heavy is a pint of Guinness?] is grand. But cycling frantically without even moving an inch seems pointless.
Last Monday, when I started, there were eight of us. On Wednesday there were five. Yesterday there were three. This course seems to have an incredibly high mortality rate? But then when you take the victim of a coronary and force him into an exercise that raises his pulse rate into the high hundreds it isn’t too surprising. I wonder if there is some kind of prize for the last man standing. A job as an apprentice with Alan Sugar?
On another note, I have noticed some distinct side effects from my “episode”.
I think I mentioned before about the bleeding? One scratch and the blood just pumps out like water. That can be quite messy, especially after a session in the garden.
Then there is the bruising. Huge multicolour bruises appear without any apparent cause. I caught my shoulder on a door during a moment of absent-mindedness and the whole upper arm now looks like The Aurora Borealis. I have little bruises on my hands and legs too and no memory of the knocks that caused them.
The main one though is the cold. Herself is a fierce one for feeling the cold. She would have the central heating on ten months a year. I on the other hand had an almost total immunity to temperature and would grudgingly use the heating for two months a year. That has changed. The first sign was my fingers turning blue and numb. When I was helping Herself through some manoeuvre she would scream that my hands were like ice. I had to take her word for it as I couldn’t feel them.
Now I have to wear sweaters all the time and will soon have to switch to my Winter gear. Our oil bill will probably go through the roof, with the only consolation being that I am helping to warm the planet.
Our oil bill though will probably give me a heart attack.
Grandad,
I declined the offer of group exercise but I can relate to the bruising. Man, I'd bruise by just passing a table! Most of the time I also felt a tad light-headed. Then a blood test showed a drop of red blood cells from normal. I didn't want to take an iron supplement along with the prescribed meds so settled for upping my intake of fresh green leaf veg and other iron rich foods. Also, what Google tells me is the elixir of iron deficiency, beetroot juice… a glass a day. A couple of weeks of that and the light headed feeling faded away and I'm bruise free. Was it was the upping of iron intake or just the slow natural healing process? No idea.
The light-headedness is something I have escaped so far. They did warn me that it might happen.
I'll be heading down to Doc in a few weeks for monitoring and he has said he may be able to take me off some of the fistful of tablets I have to swallow day and night.
That's because of the drugs, the cardiac cocktail they give all victims of heart attacks (whether they need it or not ) contains blood thiners, blood pressure reducers and anti clotting drugs. These are to ensure that you bruise whenever you're body is hit by a photon, and a sharp word from herself will cause you to donate a pint whether you will or no. (Its also supposed to stop you having another attack, or at least mitigate the affects of your next one). Also thin blood, as my mother always said, makes you feel the cold.
I was also on drugs to slow my heart rate (despite having a fairly low one) it took an emergency admission with bradycardia (heart rate of 30) before they would believe I didn't need them…
The propensity of the medical profession to prescribe drugs based on the condition and what the text books tell them, rather than to treat the patient is nothing short of malpractice in my view.
AnyHoo, glad your still up and giving shit to the world.
PS. You know the exercise thing isn't compulsory right?
Pete J,
Interesting. The med thingy, and the the ol' body adjusting to said meds, did cross my mind. Thanks.
Yes, everything I described is down to the meds – a combination of blood thinners and anti-coagulants. I did actually confirm my suspicions with a nurse. I showed her my spectacular arm-bruise and she confirmed it was the blood thinners.
So what happened to the other 5? Surely they haven't actually dropped dead! Have they just decided to risk it, rather than putting up with the torture?
As for taking exercise – I've decided to avoid it, after going out for a walk last week, and buggering over – thereby doing my left shoulder and right knee no good…
I’m with you on ‘exercise’, as someone once said, if you’re fit you don’t need it, if you’re unfit you shouldn’t do it.
I'll drink to that…
I have no idea. They probably couldn't get off work, or any other number of reasons. They may resurface next week.
I understood at one time they used to give heart patients Guiness, perhaps you should ask for it on prescription, it’s got to be more beneficial than a bucket full of tablets.
I know it was standard fare in maternity hospitals and after blood donations so it wouldn't surprise me in the least. I have tried that before with Doc, but maybe it'll work this time?
It's the beta blockers that cause the coldness, I think. They concentrate blood in the heart, leaving the extremities frozen.
Ah! Of all the side effects, that's the worst. I'm getting pissed off with the cold, even though the weather is quite mild.
Been down this road myself, heart attack,defib in the ambulance,stent in the hospital etc, when I came out of hospital after the same experience as yourself I was given appointments galore, medications by the bucket, and obviously told STOP SMOKING, but, I went on a better diet instead of the tablets, did a little more exercise of my own instead of the regime they wanted me on, walking, but I still eat the usual greasy foods, still smoke as I want, and I feel grand, that was over two years ago, life is way too short to spend it on crap you don`t want to do, and especially don`t enjoy, you gotta go sometime, enjoy it while you have it GD.
Wisdom like that brings to mind my late father's advice to me – "If you don't drink, don't smoke and don't go with mucky women, you won't live any longer but it will just feel like it". Rock on, Elwyn.
It's the drugs. Just a tiny little daily asprin and the slightest gardening scratch can pump blood all over the place. You have to learn to be careful, and always have some micropore tape handy because it won't stop on its own! And the cold, which I never used to even notice, really bites now – and hot weather knocks me out too. My operating range has reduced to between 15C and 25C, outside which range I'm useless (or more useless than usual).
If they've got you on Clopidogrel it's usually for a year, and is the drug most responsible for the massed bruising. I'm off it now and only taking Rivaroxaban and Aspirin as blood-thinners. I still bruise easy, but they're much smaller bruises. btw I'm still proud of you sticking with it for a whole week. You do know you could drive your car down the motorway in the opposite direction? Wexford is nice I hear.
Wexford is all right, but the chances are that I'd turn right in Enniscorthy and head across to West Cork! Either that or go straight on to Rosslare and on to France….
Every other person commenting had pretty well covered the bases so here's my little contribution:
Approximately 1 lb or 0.453592 kg. I suggest continuing your exercise regime by lifting a few. Don't forget to switch arms occasionally. You can enhance this exercise by walking around the pub while lifting your pint. Mind no one bumps your shoulder while lifting.
You're welcome.
Remembered from junior school: "A pint of water weighs a pound and a quarter", I imaging Guinness is similar?
(If you drink it in America of course it's only a pound 'cos they only have 16 fluid oz to their pint instead of our 20.