Born in 1914, my great uncle Norman 'Jeff' Holter
was a really, really smart man, who went to more universities than most families, was involved in the nuclear tests as Bikini Atoll, and was awarded the Associations for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation's coveted Laufman-Greatback Prize for his contributions to medical instrumentation.
This is because he invented the Holter monitor, a portable electrocardiograph device that revolutionized medicine by allowing people to get long-term heart monitoring without having to stay in a hospital. He also donated the device's rights to the medical establishment.
Yesterday I got a Holter monitor installed. It has been a long long road, and I had to get leukemia and then snap my rhythms and go A-fib, all to get strapped into the four-pad ticker-tracker that bears my family name. All so that I could make double-Holter jokes.
...not sure it was worth it. But Holter was wearing a Holter for 24 hours. Holter in a Holter! Isn't that hilarious?! Seriously, that's funny, right?
OK, imagine you're as narcissistic as I am, and just hearing your name said aloud kind of thrills you...now it's better, right?
Yesterday we met with a cardiologist. We had not had the best experience of cardiologists: a couple literally ran away before we were done asking them questions. A couple others didn't show up when my heart was cracking in the first place.
So our hopes weren't all that high, and then this guy, in an office a few blocks down the way from the hospital, is like a walk-off longball knocked out of the park by the cleanup hitter. He took a while to see us, but I think they make you promise that when you are bowing naked to Hippocrates at the 'I'm a Dr now! Screw You!' awards dinner or whatever they do to make Drs.
But once we got to him, he was thorough, and thoughtful, and listened, and formed opinions that seemed backed by his questions and our experiences. N asked him 'one last question' six or seven times, and he was ready for more. And his walls were adorned with the oddly genius paintings of his young daughter, whose capacity for early perspective and color matching to nature were, frankly, a little friggin weird.
And the long and short of it is that he thinks that the A-fib is more than likely behind me. It was most likely caused by the mixture of chemo, leukemia, and my exquisite capacity to get myself stressed out. Oh, and chemo. Did I mention chemo?
He took me off the no caffeine/no chocolate/no drinking-but-who-cares-I-don't-drink ban. He took me off the heart-slowing medication. He put a Holter on Holter (get it?! A Holt--oh screw it).
He sent us home, and we managed to cross one of the worries off our list, at least to the extent leukemia allows--the A-fib could come back, but if it does...well then, it does, and we'll deal with it. A Dr who made us feel at ease told us not to worry about it. So we won't.
And today I went to work, re-established some of the shuttered masculine silliness that drives me, brought home a little bacon, felled a mastodon with just a spear, a hyena loincloth, and my wiles (OK, I'm not sure what that last part even means).
I did three hours on an audiobook, union-covered and vocally acceptable. I could hear some quaver, I could feel that I had 95% of the acting but only 85% of the voice. But it was acceptable as a start, as a building block, and I can take that for a first day.
There will be more.
Tomorrow, in fact, and I will probably spend more time at the mic. So we're going to bed, me with a less-regulated heartbeat and a less heavy heart. Thanks, doc.
