I almost died, but didn't
December 21st, 2005 by Rick Rakauskas
Hiya.
Couple of weeks ago I had pain across my chest and left shoulder.
I ignored it of course, putting it down to muscle strain from setting my bike onto its centre stand the day before. It had happened before so I knew what it felt like.
After putting up with the pain for a day and a half, I was reading Joe Vitales book “The Attraction Factor”, and it went away for a half hour or so.
I stood up, the pain hit hard, and my heart rate zoomed up.
So I called my Doctor, who said I had better get down to his surgery pronto. Being only a 2 minute drive, this was still easy to do. The pain had subsided, and it was just a racing heartbeat that worried me a bit.
Anyway, after a nice ride in an ambulance, during which the ambo said “Geez, I’ve never seen this before” as my heart flip flopped between 70 and 215 beats a minute, I found myself in hospital.
X-rays, 5 big shots of onticoagulants and beta blockers, 4 doctors asking the same questions and next thing, I was whisked upstairs into cornary care with an ongoing “heart attack” for an angiogram and catheter insertion to place a stent into my clogged arteries. After signing the usual waivers of course.
They stuck the catheter into my right hand groin artery, and the doc said “We’re going to release the dye now, and it will feel like a warm flush”.
Which it did. The wierdest feeling ever.
Then all I heard was “mutter mutter mutter” from the 5 medical staff.
A minute later the doc came to the head of the bed and said “Mr Rakauskas, you are one of the few people walking this earth who knows for sure their coronary arteries are completely clear”.
The upshot is I have pericarditis which caused tachyarrhythmia.
Life threatening only if left untreated, because of the danger of unpumped blood clotting in the heart, then heading off to the brain to give you a stroke.
SO I could’ve died, but didn’t.
I have (or had) 2 careers, one as a copywriter, and one as a Carpenter/Builder. For the next 3 months at least I am not alowed to lift anything heavier than a nail punch, so I am effectively out of business as a Builder.
And I will take 6 to 12 weeks to get rid of the pericarditis, which is still leaving me with low energy levels (cause it is still squeezing my heart so it doesn’t pump the normal volume) and the beta blockers I use to control the rhythm keep the rate set between 58 and 86 beats a minute.
You try to have good sex when your heart rate won’t lift higher than 86, no matter how much energy you expend.
Not natural, and no fun.
So I am sort of an invalid for the next few weeks.
Nothing like this sort of experience to clear the head and create focus let me tell you.
I was always going to write full time, but the safety of the steady income from building held me back. There are a lot of web marketing projects on the back burner too that have been there for years.
After reading Joes book, I get the impression I had to have something like this happen to me so I could get the break from one career completely.
Soo I can properly focus on another.
Lessons learned so far.
Already I have a clearer focus on what needs to happen in my life.
My priorities are different now, both personally and careerwise.
I seem to be more patient, but with a sense of destiny.
My goals are clearer than they have ever been.
I now truly believe I will accomplish my goals, it’s only a matter of time.
And I have no fear.
Strange.
Even in the ambulance, I knew I wasn’t going to die, not yet anyway.
I guess the lesson is kick fear out, because in the end we are all food for worms anyway.
Get out and live life, do stuff, attempt.
Failure is only another thing that doesn’t work, which means you are closer to doing the thing that does.
Who was it gave the obituary to a man who had lived a colourless life and wound up with the words…
“…he arrived safely at death.”
Life’s short, make it great.
Rick Rakauskas
Hiya.
Couple of weeks ago I had pain across my chest and left shoulder.
I ignored it of course, putting it down to muscle strain from setting my bike onto its centre stand the day before. It had happened before so I knew what it felt like.
After putting up with the pain for a day and a half, I was reading Joe Vitales book “The Attraction Factor”, and it went away for a half hour or so.
I stood up, the pain hit hard, and my heart rate zoomed up.
So I called my Doctor, who said I had better get down to his surgery pronto. Being only a 2 minute drive, this was still easy to do. The pain had subsided, and it was just a racing heartbeat that worried me a bit.
Anyway, after a nice ride in an ambulance, during which the ambo said “Geez, I’ve never seen this before” as my heart flip flopped between 70 and 215 beats a minute, I found myself in hospital.
X-rays, 5 big shots of onticoagulants and beta blockers, 4 doctors asking the same questions and next thing, I was whisked upstairs into cornary care with an ongoing “heart attack” for an angiogram and catheter insertion to place a stent into my clogged arteries. After signing the usual waivers of course.
They stuck the catheter into my right hand groin artery, and the doc said “We’re going to release the dye now, and it will feel like a warm flush”.
Which it did. The wierdest feeling ever.
Then all I heard was “mutter mutter mutter” from the 5 medical staff.
A minute later the doc came to the head of the bed and said “Mr Rakauskas, you are one of the few people walking this earth who knows for sure their coronary arteries are completely clear”.
The upshot is I have pericarditis which caused tachyarrhythmia.
Life threatening only if left untreated, because of the danger of unpumped blood clotting in the heart, then heading off to the brain to give you a stroke.
SO I could’ve died, but didn’t.
I have (or had) 2 careers, one as a copywriter, and one as a Carpenter/Builder. For the next 3 months at least I am not alowed to lift anything heavier than a nail punch, so I am effectively out of business as a Builder.
And I will take 6 to 12 weeks to get rid of the pericarditis, which is still leaving me with low energy levels (cause it is still squeezing my heart so it doesn’t pump the normal volume) and the beta blockers I use to control the rhythm keep the rate set between 58 and 86 beats a minute.
You try to have good sex when your heart rate won’t lift higher than 86, no matter how much energy you expend.
Not natural, and no fun.
So I am sort of an invalid for the next few weeks.
Nothing like this sort of experience to clear the head and create focus let me tell you.
I was always going to write full time, but the safety of the steady income from building held me back. There are a lot of web marketing projects on the back burner too that have been there for years.
After reading Joes book, I get the impression I had to have something like this happen to me so I could get the break from one career completely.
Soo I can properly focus on another.
Lessons learned so far.
Already I have a clearer focus on what needs to happen in my life.
My priorities are different now, both personally and careerwise.
I seem to be more patient, but with a sense of destiny.
My goals are clearer than they have ever been.
I now truly believe I will accomplish my goals, it’s only a matter of time.
And I have no fear.
Strange.
Even in the ambulance, I knew I wasn’t going to die, not yet anyway.
I guess the lesson is kick fear out, because in the end we are all food for worms anyway.
Get out and live life, do stuff, attempt.
Failure is only another thing that doesn’t work, which means you are closer to doing the thing that does.
Who was it gave the obituary to a man who had lived a colourless life and wound up with the words…
“…he arrived safely at death.”
Life’s short, make it great.
Rick Rakauskas
posted by Rick Rakauskas at 10:33 AM
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