Monday, June 25, 2007
Don't Worry, Be Happy
The other day I mentioned that I once woke up in the middle of a medical procedure on my heart. It may have sounded worse than it was. This wasn't open heart surgery or anything like that. It was a procedure called ablation. (I think I spelled that right)
Anyway the deal was my heart would suddenly start racing. On one visit to the ER they clocked it at 278 beats per minute, better than four a second. Over time they finally diagnosed me with something called Wolfe-Parkinson-White and scheduled me for this procedure where they went up the artery, or was it vein, into my groin and used a laser to burn some fibers in my heart which basically were causing a short circuit.
That said, it does hurt like hell to wake while someone is scorching your heart. Like most everything in my life this story does have an absurd twist.
I'm a hairy guy. Besides the chin rug I also have a good bit of fuzz elsewhere. Therefore they had to shave to round patches on my chest to place some kind of monitoring device.
After I got home from the hospital I thought it would be a good idea (don't ask me why) to shave a large arc across my stomach that dipped down below my belly button. In other words I created a happy face on the trunk of my body. I did this to show my wife, and get a chuckle from a select group of friends.
I assumed my belly and chest hair would grow rather rapidly, like my beard and the hair on my head.
Here's a lesson.
Never assume.
Belly and chest hair grows extremely slow.
Several months later I return to the doctor for a check up. The nurse tells me to take off my shirt and hop up on the table. She takes one look at my artwork and in a flat deadpan voice says, "Oh, that's cute."
Thought y'all might find it humorous to discover jsut how big a doofus I can be.
Anyway the deal was my heart would suddenly start racing. On one visit to the ER they clocked it at 278 beats per minute, better than four a second. Over time they finally diagnosed me with something called Wolfe-Parkinson-White and scheduled me for this procedure where they went up the artery, or was it vein, into my groin and used a laser to burn some fibers in my heart which basically were causing a short circuit.
That said, it does hurt like hell to wake while someone is scorching your heart. Like most everything in my life this story does have an absurd twist.
I'm a hairy guy. Besides the chin rug I also have a good bit of fuzz elsewhere. Therefore they had to shave to round patches on my chest to place some kind of monitoring device.
After I got home from the hospital I thought it would be a good idea (don't ask me why) to shave a large arc across my stomach that dipped down below my belly button. In other words I created a happy face on the trunk of my body. I did this to show my wife, and get a chuckle from a select group of friends.
I assumed my belly and chest hair would grow rather rapidly, like my beard and the hair on my head.
Here's a lesson.
Never assume.
Belly and chest hair grows extremely slow.
Several months later I return to the doctor for a check up. The nurse tells me to take off my shirt and hop up on the table. She takes one look at my artwork and in a flat deadpan voice says, "Oh, that's cute."
Thought y'all might find it humorous to discover jsut how big a doofus I can be.
13 comments:
Hi! If Belly and chest hair grows extremely slow, then why does ear and nose hair grow like there is no tomorrow? It's not fair!!!
Best wishes,
Skeeter
Love it, even though it's a second helping of this one dish on your personality.
xo
~C
to Assume makes an ass out of you and me. Or in this case, just you. ;lol, sorry.
I would have thought you'd have shaved one "eye" so it looked like it had a "pirates patch" over it.
When I was stationed in Hawaii (in the Army) my buddy's husband decided as a joke to smear sun block on his stomach in the words "Sun God" and then he got distracted somehow, fell asleep and got burned to a crisp. Two years later the words were still faintly visible.
Diet coke just came out of my nose. I used to work in the ER and a smiley face, while funny, is not the weirdest thing I've seen shaved and/or tanned onto someone's torso. I bet your wife laughed at you, and you know the nurses were laughing about it the rest of the day!
No pictures?!?!
Oh, holy crap that's funny!
Uh, not the part about you waking up in pain, though! Yeowch!
nicely wrought! lol
g'luck catching the biggie, travis :)
LOL. At least you were being a harmless doofus.
I think you should have posted a picture. I mean, really.
I have never had heart or brain surgery...ergo there is no conclusive proof that I have either one.
That's hysterical. As a former healthcare practitioner, I can bet the nurse was very amused but had learned from her own experiences not to assume you found it funny, as well. I got busted mid-chuckle a couple of times before I realized it was better to just keep a straight face until I left the room.
You made me laugh so hard I choked! I suspect nurses and doctors see much weirder things that happy faces shaved on stomachs, though!
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