Hi all,
Apologies for the Mills and Boon heading but well, it made me laugh at any rate 🙂
Mainly all is fine with me – I won't pretend it's a barrel of laughs, but the headlines are I'm making the slightly tricky transition back to 'normal' life and work etc, coming to terms with what's happened in the last 11 months, but feel grateful that the myeloma is at bay for now.
My question is a slightly random one, just in case anyone has had a similar experience or advice – and if not then at least by writing on here it might help someone in future.
For my trial I had to have echocardiograms before and after chemo. (It's an ultrasound of your heart). After the second one, they saw something – said it could have been a mistake, or my Hickman line, or 'thickening' but sent me for a heart MRI. After that, I got summoned for a TOE which is a transoesophageal echo looking at your heart from the back, so they shove a tube down your throat (UGH – not recommended!!) As the letter arrived on a Saturday, I had no way of asking what this was for but terrified myself by googling things on the internet but then decided to stop and get on with life. It was booked for the same day as I was next seeing my consultant anyway. I had it, and it found a 1x2cm mass in the right atrium of my heart, appearance suggesting a blood clot or muscle ridge. I'd been sedated so my memory of what they said is pretty hazy, but that was written on the report. It also said I should go onto blood thinners and have another scan in 6 weeks and see cardiologists in 8 weeks. I finally saw my consultant around 7pm the same day (clinic late due to new computer system) and she was quite surprised by it all but set me up to get started on blood thinners from the following morning. This proved to be the biggest problem of all as I had to keep going twice a week to hospital get my levels checked, plus inject myself every day etc. Now that I'm back at work, this was all a bit exhausting as the hospital is in the opposite direction to my office, and suddenly I was at hospital up to 3 times a week, just when I thought it was tailing off, and I was trying to get up early and yoyoing between all three places via bus, tube etc – which is all still a bit much with current energy levels.
Anyway… moan over! I've got another echocardiogram on Thursday (from outside chest not down throat, phew) and then it says I'll see cardiologists the same day. No idea on timing but at least I'll be able to ask what's going on and I won't be sedated this time! So I thought I'd ask your collective wisdoms.
Has anyone had anything similar? Do you know how long it takes blood clots to dissolve with blood thinners, if that's what it is? I'm aware that sometimes there can be clots with Hickman lines (I had one in for 6 months). I don't have any other symptoms of heart problems and I think all the rest of the MRI/echo results for my heart were normal. In fact, I'm pretty sure (although it's hazy) that they looked back at the scan which was done BEFORE chemo and said it was already there, so it may just be a long-standing defect or something. As long as they don't think it's something that needs even more investigations, I'm happy! I don't fancy heart surgery 🙂 though I'm hoping that's unlikely.
I'll let you know how it turns out, anyway.
Hoping also they take me off blood thinners, partly as they don't mix well with alcohol! I missed my birthday last year (was the day I went into hospital and came out 4 weeks later) so I decided to celebrate very belatedly and I'm having a 33 and 333 days party the weekend after next, it would be nice to be able to enjoy some bubbles at that 🙂
Helen
eve 11 years, 4 months ago.
