Day To Day Living With Heart..Failure

First of all, let me say flat out, I hate that word: Failure.  Ugh.  Even worse: Heart Failure.  Double Ugh.


Sometimes I feel like saying UP YOURS medical professional.

My heart may be not quite up to snuff these days, but it's done a REMARKABLE job of getting me this far. I found a site that estimates how many heart beats I have had since the day I was born, and for me that number is:


1,695,879,288!!  (You can check yours too, here:   Heart Beats and Breaths Since You Were Born)

So that's not bad for a supposed heart FAILURE.

Yet I see HEART FAILURE on just about every pill bottle and medical form that comes my way.  And it seems like it's on the tip of the tongue of just about every doctor I speak with these days.

HEART FAILURE HEART FAILURE HEART FAILURE HEART FAILURE HEART FAILURE

It gets kinda old. I think I might ask the doctors not to say that around me.  I'll probably get the deer in the headlights look, and this may be silly perhaps, but who, or what, like's to be called a failure??
                                                                                 

heart MALFUNCTION    heart BREAKDOWN    heart DECLINE

        heart GIVIN' ER ALL SHE'S GOT JIM 

Anyway, day to day living is getting more and more challenging.  Maybe part of it is the recent heat wave of shorts we've had here in Iowa.  And it's not the heat so much, as the stinkin' humidity.   Thank goodness for air conditioning.   But even in the air conditioning I am super tired.  Slept almost 12 straight hours last night, got up, had a bite to eat, and slept another 3.  And it's deep, dead to the world, sleep.  And even now I feel like I could sleep 4 or 5 hours more, no problem.

That's the biggest symptom for me right now, is this nearly constant, debilitating fatigue.  And it gets worse if I try to actually exert myself.  Like empty the dishwasher, or climb a flight of stairs.  I just get out of breath so quickly(dyspnea), and my heart starts to feel like it might come out of my chest.  And that feeling is kind of scary at first, but I am used to it now...which is weird.  I do a lot of sitting on the couch these days...and that's not like me.

And I do seem to be coughing more, for no good reason.  And my legs hurt some times.  Both symptoms getting worse, almost daily it seems.

But the good news is I've really never had chest pain, and remarkably I don't seem to have any of the fluid retention that is common in heart failure.

FYI, I am currently classified with Class III heart failure, but I have to be darn close to Class IV.

Class	Patient Symptoms
Class I (Mild)	No limitation of physical activity. Ordinary physical activity does not cause undue fatigue, palpitation, or dyspnea (shortness of breath).
Class II (Mild)	Slight limitation of physical activity. Comfortable at rest, but ordinary physical activity results in fatigue, palpitation, or dyspnea.
Class III (Moderate)	Marked limitation of physical activity. Comfortable at rest, but less than ordinary activity causes fatigue, palpitation, or dyspnea.
Class IV (Severe)	Unable to carry out any physical activity without discomfort. Symptoms of cardiac insufficiency at rest. If any physical activity is undertaken, discomfort is increased.

From the NYHA (New York Heart Association Functional Classification...widely used)

Bottom line, it is what it is.  I try not to fret about it too much.  But I have had to learn to roll with the punches, and do what I can, and only what I can. Which is very hard for me and my stubbornness, cause I really don't like to at least not TRY to do the things I used to be able to do.  But I increasingly pay the price for not accepting this new 'normal'.  And I understand and accept its probably going to get worse before I get the call.

So now, I'm going to go take a nap, and try to recharge.

Make it a great day everyone!