Life is not a competition

I learned a valuable lesson last week. I had an atrial fibrillation episode on Wednesday evening and when my blood pressure (BP) climbed to 220/120 and my pulse rate was 120, I bowed to my wife Barb’s demands and allowed her to call for an ambulance.

The usual deal: great ambos put me at ease and compassionately transported me to the nearest Emergency Department (ED), 30 minutes away, where I was triaged and allocated a bed.

An urgent blood test showed I wasn’t having a heart attack. So, it was just a matter of waiting until the symptoms settled enough to sign me out. Within an hour, my BP was under 200, pulse mid-90s.

An early despatch looked imminent.

Then, it got interesting. Barb drove into town to support me and drive me home.

However, at the ED entrance, she rolled her ankle on a concrete step and would have crashed heavily had it not been for a quick-thinking ambo who caught her just centimetres from the tarmac.

She managed to stagger to Bed 3 and collapsed into my bedside chair. She was in obvious distress. So, the nursing staff triaged her and arranged for a doctor to attend ASAP.

Meanwhile, my BP troughed in the mid-160s and my pulse was back to the low-90s.

The keyboards were clacking – I was ready for discharge, even though my heartbeat was still irregular and I felt  quite unwell.

They disconnected me from the monitoring devices, and Barb and I switched places. She was much more comfortable with her leg elevated and I was grateful to be seated.

After much prodding and jumping about, to say nothing of a couple of involuntary profanities, the decision was made to place Barb’s lower leg in a plaster cast. The trainee doctor and solitary nurse struggled to navigate Barb’s longer-than-average legs. So, I was commandeered to assist with the cast installation. All went well and the damaged joint was stabilised.

A strip of impressive painkillers for Barb, and we were both discharged. The nurse arranged a wheelchair for Barb while I wandered into the darkness to locate and retrieve her little car.

I reversed into the ambulance zone where the nurse and I funnelled the trussed Barb into the passenger seat.

Once home, I took on the darkness again and located a pair of crutches in the garden shed.

Barb was a little rusty with these after a hip replacement 18 months earlier, but we managed to navigate the potholes in the front yard and ascend the steps into the house. Considerable fumbling ensued as Barb was disentangled from her apparel, toileted and placed in bed at 2am.

Next morning at 8am, Barb was summoned to appear at Radiology before revisiting ED for a professionally conducted moon-boot fitting.

It was only when the chaos abated that I had a chance to reflect on my  own situation.

I was grumpy. My head was throbbing, my heart was still out of rhythm, I wasn’t game to check my BP and I hadn’t eaten since the previous evening.

It was only after a tense verbal fracas with Barb that I realised the reason for my grumpiness: I felt displaced and neglected when her swollen ankle attracted more attention than my boring heart monitor.

I felt ashamed that I might feel resentment toward the amazing lady  who had done so much for me during  my long-term illnesses, treatments  and recuperation.

When I stopped feeling sorry for myself, my headache and anxiety chest pain subsided, and a sense of calm settled on the household.

Gotta go now. Barb’s trying to do the dishes while balancing on crutches. What could possibly go wrong?

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 Charlie Griffiths is a certified life coach and Neuro Linguistic Programming practitioner dedicated to helping fellow professionals thrive with a chronic disease or serious injury.