Does your body and/or your brain require you to take prescription drugs? Bitch about it here.

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Does your body and/or your brain require you to take prescription drugs? Bitch about it here.

(This topic of discussion is connected to an entry I wrote at my website: ALIVE AT FORTY-FIVE! GETTING MY KICKS AT FORTY-SIX! The entry is entitled: "Leg Twitches", and is dated Wednesday, May 3, 2000.)



-- Zoomer (fortyfiver@yahoo.com), May 05, 2000

Answers

I have a heart condition called atrial fribulation. It is a quivering of the lower part of the heart which makes my heart race and beat irregularly. It isn't painful, but is a bother, because when it races I get out of breath and dizzy. But the main thing is that when it does this there is a high risk of stroke. So because of this stupid irregular heart beat thing I have to take medication. One is called Rhythmol and is used to control the rhythum of my heart, and the other is Coumadin, which is a blood thinner to keep blood clots from forming and entering my brain causing a stroke. They are both expensive, and eventhough I have insurance which pays 80% it is still an expense I would rather not have. I'm supposed to take the Rhythmol 3 times a day, but for some reason I can only manage to take it 2 times a day, no matter how hard I try to remember the afternoon pill, I just can't seem to manage it. I was supposed to take it faithfully 3 times a day while on a trip recently, because I was going to a very remote area, and the Dr. didn't want me to have a problem. Just before I went on this trip I had an episode where my heart went into afib and would not convert back to normal rhythum. It took about 5 hours for it to convert. The doctor was concerned that it might happen while I was on this trip into the field with a bunch of botanists and that I would need to get to a hospital which would be about a two hour drive.

Luckily nothing happened, and my heart behaved itself. I was really lucky, because not only did I forget to take the third pill each day, but I forgot to take all of them several days. I don't know why, but for some reason I just couldn't remember to take them. Probably because I was in a new environment, with new people, and not in my normal routine.

Anyway, I guess I should be thankful that there are pills that help this condition, and stop being a cry baby and just take the damn things.

em

-- Marilynn Karbonski (emsoul@yahoo.com), May 09, 2000.


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