Give yourself what you need

Your body is smart enough to take care of itself if you listen to it

The last few years on some days I have taken a beating on the race course. On a dreadful day, my heart rate will escalate to over extremely high with very painful, fearful, frightening consequence. Tunnel vision, dizziness, weaving around, fatigue, pain, cramping, nausea and a nasty pounding headache.

Because of that, I have not signed up for any long-distance events for fear of another whipping with the possible outcome of death. I have seen dead people on the race course (in my age group probably) and it is not pretty…I was hoping this whole thing would go away, but it has not.

So, off to (another) cardiologist.

After a fact-finding question and answer period, the conversation goes something like this:

·         You are over 50

·         You are a big guy (200 pounds with less than 15% body fat)

·         You are tall (6”2”) and your feet are a long way away from your heart.

·         You do a lot of long distance endurance events over a period of decades.

·         Combined with other signs/symptoms, he says I know what you have

90% chance you have atrial fibrillation

It’s not fatal

It is an uncomfortable annoyance

We need to dig deeper to find the triggers and get more data

And it will likely worsen as years’ pass” (Lucky me!)

Ok, so after in-depth studies Dr. Google, he probably is right on with the diagnosis. Dr. Phil agrees.

Now what? Shall I quit? Trade in my ironman finisher coats for a watching NASCAR on TV coat? Take up petting cats? Not good options for me.

His advice? More testing, but most importantly throw away the heart rate monitor. Listen to your body instead. Inside my head, I scream really loudly “WHAT? Not by baby! My life revolves around my Garmin. Tell me anything except for that!”

He said “Some days you will feel like running. So, run and don’t slow down because of a number on a screen. Listen to yourself. Sometimes you won’t feel like running or running fast. So, don’t. You won’t need a heart rate monitor to know if you’re having an A-Fib episode. Listen to your body and give it what it needs”

That sounds old school. I know how to do that! And in addition to what they taught me in chiropractic college, that is also what Mel Preedy told me when I first started this running thing many moons ago. I also believe it to be true.

“And, buy a power meter for your bike. (Now I really like this guy). Watch it instead.”

So, I am now running and riding without my eyes glued to the screen. I must admit it is freeing.

I also bought an ActivCore mobile EKG I will be carrying around to document my episodes. So, if you see me on the side of the road fiddling with more gadgets, don’t worry about me.

Then there is the last 10% of what if’s. Yes, there are a lot of what if’s. I personally would rather go down as a warrior than a watcher. Got to die of something. May as well be having too much fun and spending too much money.

Please don’t think this is meant to be a diagnosis for you. Everybody is different. If you have some issue that is not going away, go get a professional opinion.