(no subject)

My job interviewish thing went well, I think. There were about 40 or so of us. They gave us a presentation about the company that was chock-full of marketing lingo (ugh) then handed around a stapled packet that turned out to be a test. Some of it was reading comprehension, and some was assessing assessment skills. If I didn't suck (and I'm not thinking I did) I should hear back by late next week for round two, which will determine if I fit in with their 'culture' (@@). This company seems to be growing at a tremendous pace. They had Guitar Hero and Rock Band in their game room. It's sure different from the state.

trip to the ER

I went to bed thinking, it would sure be nice if I could sleep all the way through the night tonight. I hadn't gotten more than 4 hours of sleep the previous two nights, so was looking forward to sleeping all the way to the alarm. I did not get my wish.

I woke up around 4:30 and felt a stabbing pain in my chest. I rolled over on my side, and that made it a lot worse, as did inhaling. I sat up and tried to stretch backwards, which hurt like hell, then folded forward, which relieved things somewhat. But it still hurt to breathe, and at some point I thought "wait, I am having chest pains" and came fully awake. I've had the occasional muscular twinge, but those go away after a minute or so, and this wasn't going away. Eric woke up and asked what was wrong, and got the laptop to see if we could figure out what was up, but the interwebs was not very useful. It kept not getting better, and brought tears to my eyes when I tried to breathe deeply, so we decided to visit the nearby emergency room. Dad's had enough heart attacks that I figured I'd rather be safe than sorry.

I got there and there was the usual paper-filling-out and questions. I was checked into an ER bed, and about the time they hooked me up to all the machinery, the pain stopped. Naturally. Then I waited and waited and waited. My heart rate was hovering around 55, and if I relaxed enough for it to drop below 50 it would start making alarmed noises, so no relaxing for me. I also played with the respiratory monitor, trying to make certain shapes by holding my breath in certain ways. I got the Devil's Tower from Close Encounters down pretty well, but was only able to make the mittens if I laughed in a certain way. By that point I was in no pain at all, and considered leaving- but I imagined I was already into the hospital for a few thousand (or Blue Cross is at any rate) and I may as well get my money's worth.

They did a quickie chest x-ray in the bed, and took some blood. They said there was what might look like an air bubble in my lungs (I said that seeing air in the lungs seemed like a good thing, but air in bubble form evidently is not) so they wheeled me out for more complete x-rays. Then more waiting. I found a Cheech and Chong movie on the little tv. Some guy who was obviously either over-medicated or not sufficiently medicated started cursing and trying to pick a fight with one of the nurses, and cops were called. The doctor reviewed all my labwork and came in to chat.

My ECG looked fine. I have a copy, and it says I have "marked sinus bradycardia", which apparently means I've got a slower heartbeat than expected, which I attribute to my extreme mellowness- the doctor did not seem worried. All of my bloodwork seemed normal enough with the exception of one value. The CK level, or creatine kinase, was very high- normal is 21-215, and mine's 542. High CK levels can mean a lot of things, including heart attacks, renal failure, degenerative muscle disease, and so on. I didn't have any other indications of any of these other things (aside from the chest pain) so the doctor said "if you do a big work-out or strenuous activity you sometimes get a reading like this." He looked at my not-quite-willow-thin physique and said doubtfully "you haven't done anything like that, have you?" I thought back to Wednesday night and said "yes." He wanted details. I hedged- "I did some aerobic activity." He wanted more details. "I had a lot of sex, okay?" He looked at me sideways and asked "was it strenuous?" I felt myself turning scarlet and said "Yes, it was pretty strenuous." He tried not to smile, and I think I heard Eric trying not to laugh, and he finally told me he thinks I probably just pulled something somewhere, and while there's never a zero chance that something horrible is happening, he was willing to either let me go or I could stick around and do a treadmill test and get an echocardiogram. I asked if he thought I needed it, and he said, essentially, not really. I was told to stay home from work today (yay!) and not do anything strenuous (aw, hell; Brö had shown up and said "you're a girl; just lie there") for a couple of days. I got unplugged from the various monitoring devices and sent home.

I haven't felt so much as a twinge since. I have copies of my ECG and bloodwork, and am supposed to go see my regular doctor Monday (well, probably Tuesday) for follow-up- I imagine they'll forward the radiology reports and such to her. I'm not too worried at this point, but I'll be taking it easy. Eric and Brö and I are all taking today off. Non-heart attack holiday!