I'm a Bruiser, Baby...

One of the perks of having Coronary Artery Disease is getting to take not one, but two different anticoagulant medications. Anticoagulants are taken to thin your blood and prevent clots from forming. This is handy if, like me, you have a problem with such things. I once had two large blood clots in my heart, but thanks to the magical world of anticoagulation, they are gone. My current regimen consists of the medication Coumadin topped off with one baby Asprin.

My Cardiologist wants my blood thin like water.

The flip side of anticoagulation therapy is that, well, sometimes blood clotting is a good thing. Like if you cut yourself. I knew I was in trouble the first time I went to the pharmacy counter to buy the Asprin along with the Coumadin:

"Does your doctor know you're taking Asprin?"

"Yes"

"Does he know you're taking Coumadin?"

"That's his name on the pill bottle. I certainly hope so."

*stare*

*return stare*

"Ok then" *rings me up*

So basically I have to be extremely careful around sharp objects. One enthusiastic welcome home from the dogs and I look like I've been in a fist fight. As a result of this and my lousy sense of balance, I am often covered with bruises.

Yesterday I received perhaps my most creative bruise to date. I was leaning over to give Scout a hug on the couch when Lucy decided she was ready to rumble. Upon Lucy's attack, Scout snapped her head back and cracked her skull against my forehead. Sigh. Now I have a nice goose egg to accessorize my dress for the wedding I'm attending on Saturday. Nice.

I'll leave you with a visual (slightly graphic, sorry). This is a picture of my arm upon returning home from one of my hospital stays in Arizona. Because I have a dialysis fistula in my left arm, that makes it off limits for any IVs or blood draws. This on top of dehydration and having weakened veins from hundreds (thousands? I've lost track) of prior needle sticks makes my right arm not the best target. I think they had tried 18 different IV sites here and a good 20 or so blood draws:

Comments

The League said…
And let me tell you, there is nothing I like better than the wheels turning when we've been to the ER after Jamie's injured herself, etc... the nurses see the bruises and start asking if she "feels safe at home".
October 8, 2009 at 3:39 PM
J.S. said…
And what Jamie's post fails to mention is that she also happens to be one of the clumsier, or at least more accident prone, people that I know (sorry, Jamie, but it's true), which doesn't help with the whole thing. Behave yourself, McSteans, or Roundball and I WILL hold you down and mummify you in bubble wrap.
October 9, 2009 at 10:54 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

October Update

So. Today I went in for a couple of procedures that I have known were coming for a few months now. For those not up to date, I have long had cardiac issues stemming from my even longer-term kidney issues. For those who are up to date, forgive me for repeating myself a bit.  Luckily until this year I have not had any symptoms. This spring I started feeling bad.  Shortness of breath, a strange scratchy sensation in my chest, coughing, and just running on an even lower level of energy than usual. In July I had a left heart catheter. At that time my cardiologist determined that my lower left ventricle was working extra hard to keep blood out of the upper ventricle and by turn out of my lungs. This is referred to as Mitral Regurgitation . The plan was for me to pull as much fluid as possible at dialysis to relieve some of the pressure in my heart. I did start feeling a bit better due to this action in the past couple of weeks, but we still needed to go back in and check that pressure under
Read more

Cardiac Update

Image
This is not part of The Diagnosis, but I'm sure I'll incorporate it at some point. I wanted to document yesterday (well really the past few months) for myself, but also to have an easy thing to point to when anyone asks what's new with me. I believe when promoting the last chapter of The Diagnosis (Matters of the Heart: the Second Part), I described it as "wrapping up the cardio portion of the story". Something in the back of my head told me not to phrase it that way, that I was tempting fate, and yet I did it anyway. Friends, always listen to the back of your head. I am indeed not done with this cardiac mess. Sometime starting last spring I started experiencing occasional shortness of breath along with some hard to define other symptoms and more pronounced fatigue. (I am a mostly functional human being, but I do require lengthy naps in the afternoon to be  functional.) At the time, I chalked it up to seasonal allergies or the seasons changing. It is not uncommon
Read more

Matters of the Heart, the Second Part

Image
Previously on The Diagnosis *This chapter jumps a bit in time. It is in chronological order, but continues right up to the present. I wanted to package all of the cardiology portions in one place for easier reading. After this we will return to 2008 and finish the story according to the timeline from there.  After my denial of a third kidney transplant I was forced to take a serious look at my heart health. I honestly had no one to blame but myself about how much I had ignored it until that moment. In my mind I was a kidney patient. There was no room for anything else. Go ahead, question me about Focal and Segmental Glomerulosclerosis! Want to know about Plasmapheresis with Albumin Exchange? Ask this gal right here. Have a question about renal transplants or dialysis? I'm your huckleberry.  Ok, McSteans, but what's going on with your heart? .... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I knew I was on maintenance blood thinners (Coumadin) for blood clotting, had experienced a silent heart attack prior to goi
Read more