When Anxiety Becomes Reality

Let's get one thing straight, I NEVER liked roller coasters to begin with, however for those you who DO, I HIGHLY recommend staying off this one. One year at Six Flags Great Adventure, my wife, an avid roller coaster rider, demanded I go with her on "The Great American Scream Machine". I had no less than 6 panic attacks waiting on that line and as they strapped me in, I didn't feel secure enough and was flailing my arms in the air like a maniac to get the attention of the high 18 year old to come check my seatbelt. As we were about to "take off", I noticed the car in front of us stall on the climb. I screamed so that someone would notice and not let us go and be stuck. Of course all my screaming and panic did nothing because the people who run the rides notice these things, but as they let us off the ride due to the delay - it made my wife VERY happy watching me panic and she laughed at it not on for the rest of the day, but still today, probably 12-13 years...

Yesterday was a sunny and fair weather day. At 9 AM, I went outside to the front of my house, set up a chair, took off my mask and sat there, staring at the sky. Sounds boring? It was. Fabulously and gloriously boring. The happiest boredom I've had in weeks.  My wife joined me at one point and we even sat together. Doing absolutely nothing but basking in the weather. Between the hours of 9 AM and 1 PM we had a number of visitors who passed by. Everyone was sure to keep their safe distance, but in that span of time, I must have seen 15-20 people all "happy" to see me (at least that's what they said) - sorry, low self esteem. I had extremely knowledgeable doctors visit to discuss my case and numbers, offering tips and other forms of help, I had friends who just saw me and stopped to say hi.  As a natural born cynic, I tend to hate people and have 0 faith in humanity (sorry, harsh reality), but yesterday, seeing people, felt great. We did it in a safe way and nobody stay...

With each setback, or new test, or additional days added on to the "timeline", I lose my battle with my mental health. Number 1 fear: getting sick again. If I am now being asked to stay home for X days/weeks while they finalize some things, how can they guarantee I won't wind up sick again given my current physical status. I've become overly obsessed with how I feel walking up and down steps. It legit winds me and I need to limit that activity as much as possible. My heart rate soars, i start to sweat, and it puts me into a panic. Is this an indication of another fever? I take my temp. Of course it's elevated! My body just worked OVERTIME to climb my steps. OK, relax. get into bed. have a drink. slow your heart rate, check again. 99.3? I'll take it, but it's not 98.5. Am I getting sick again? How long will I be stuck in the hospital for this time? Will it be as serious as the last time? What will the setbacks be? This is my struggle. Not daily, but each an...

For 2 days last week, sitting septic with 103.1 fever with no break, I couldn't move. I couldn't even angle my body or position myself in an easier way for the doctors. Sorry, it was not happening. 4 weeks prior, I was deadlifting 405 lbs, doing 3-4 intense peloton rides a week, walking 7-8 miles each Saturday and bench pressing up to 185/190lbs in addition to the other forms of regular weight training I was doing. But for 2, maybe even 2.5 days, I couldn't move.  I've heard my share from people poking fun of my workout regiment prior to getting sick. I heard people telling me to slow down or be careful or why I was even trying so hard. That last question I still don't have an answer for. I don't know what motivated me a few years ago to set out on a healthier lifestyle journey, all I know is that today, it's helping save my life. My heart remains healthy no matter how many EKGs or Echo Cardiograms they want to run. My valves are terrific no matter how many ...

On Friday I was told if everything stays stable, I needed a PICC line installed Monday (They dont "do those" on the weekend) and be sent home Monday.  Within 12 hours of this happening, my body threw a loop.  99.6 temp type of loop. I panicked. Full Panic. Not the type of panic attack that makes you scared, but full blown loss of hope, angry panic. The nurses tried calming me down, saying it could be a fluke, lowering the AC in my room to a more normal temperature as it was warm in there, and we would see what the next vitals reading would be. 2 hours never took so long. I wanted to go on full rage and throw things against the wall. No matter what anyone tells you, "take it one day at a time" or "you're in the right place, better you have a fever here than at home", when you're THAT close to progressing forward in your treatment and there is potential setback, the room you've been in all week transforms into a 12 x 12 cell, and you feel like a ...

5/7 Frustration is an emotion I don't know what to do with. Someone told me yesterday about a book they read that underlined the 3 solutions to life's problems. 1. Accept it. 2.  Change it. 3. Leave it. So, for example, if you are at a dead-end job that you cannot stand, you can accept it and make the best of it, change it by confronting that which you believe is making you upset and making it better, or leave it and find another job. They equated it to my situation. I can't change it. I am sick. There's nothing to Change. I can't leave it/Ignore it, because that is just not an option. My only option is to learn to accept it. And that's what I'm trying to do. When faced with the variety of emotions that I am hit with on a daily basis, I do my best to accept it. See the good, see the bad and marry them, I've said this in a prior blog. But frustration and uncertainty are 2 extremely hard emotions for me to process. The answer is to clearly accept it. Accep...

5/6  "Ya know", she said to me, "If you came in here and had a BRING IT ON ATTITUDE, saying things like 'It's no big deal', or 'this will be a breeze', then I'd be concerned. The fact that you are self aware enough to realize that there will be ups and downs, positives and negatives and EXPRESS that so openly, tells me you are ready for what this journey will bring. It's the people who come in fooling themselves we have the most issues with" My fever remains down for a second day without using Tylenol or anything and then a real defining moment. My morning labs came in. As I watched the nurse erase the prior days' labs, 2 things occurred to me: 1. I definitely should have paid more attention in BIO class because I have been SO LOST through all of this 2. Her penmanship, especially for writing on a wipe board, was impeccable.  But I digress... My white blood count had not doubled from the day before, but rather TRIPLED! My Hemoglobin c...