Changes

Sorry it has been over a month between entries, but things have been a little turned upside in my life. You will remember that back in May I had not been feeling well and was diagnosed with bronchitis. Well, I was still feeling sluggish, coughing a lot and short of breath when I walked any distance, long or short. I went back to my doctor on June 21 and after going through some respiratory tests, I then had a chest x-ray taken and then an EKG. The doctor noticed that I had an enlarged heart and of course the EKG reading was abnormal. I went to the cardiologist on June 30 and he immediately admitted me to the hospital where I spent a week (8 days) bored out of my mind. I had a Echocardiogram on the 30th and a Cardiac Catheterization on Monday the 3rd. The catheterization they had to go up through my groin.
Basically the doctors think that the bronchitis may have been viral insted of bacterial and attacked my heart. The strange thing is while I was in Germany visiting Dorman, we walked to the Bahnhof to catch the train to Würburg a couple times and then I was coughing and out of breath a little while we were walking. I am now down to 160 lbs and probably will stay at that weight for quite a while, since I have to keep my sodium intake between 2000-2400 miligrams. I also cannot ride the bicycle this summer, which is one of my favorite things to do, or lift anything over ten pounds. The beginning of the school year should be interesting in light of not being able to lift/carry anything heavy.

Anyways, I would like to thank my mother and father for their support and being there at the hospital for me (my mom got there on the 1st and left with me on the 8th and my dad came the 1st and the 3rd so he could be there before my catheterization and after), my brother and nephew Nathan for visiting me on the 1st and use of the portable DVD player, Monique for being there for me as usual and trying to cheer me up, Joel for the daily yahoo updates before I went in to the hospital and for calling to check up on me each night I was there and Dean for calling to find out how I was doing, which a very cool surpise :)

As soon as I find out anything new, I'll try and post it here if I feel comfortable doing so.

P.S. Joel, Melissa and Emily just came to visit this weekend on their way to Williamsburg, VA and Busch Gardens. We visited the Museum of the American Indian and the Museum of Natural History on Saturday, and then the National Zoo on Sunday. I have the pics from the zoo on cd and will put them on my yahoo pics page with a link as soon as I do. Joel has the pics from the museums, if I get those I'll put them up as well.