The day when I found out my heart is broken (literally)...

     How could I ever forget that day, I’ am ready and preparing myself to have that job, if I pass and get in that is the first time I would able to work in an Electronics company, good thing the “medical check-up of the applicants” are provided by the Electronics company, I don’t need to invest money for it. Got up early and found myself as one of those people in line for medical check ups then my name is called, getting my Blood pressure by the nurse. “What the?”--- the nurse said, in a shocked reaction then asked me “are you nervous?, is this your first time for this?” calming me as possible for she thought I’ am nervous, then she said “let’s try again”… still in disbelief, she called the doctor, the doctor said… “why do have such a high Blood pressure in a body like that?”—laughing then say to me “relax”… then, get the BP from the nurse and he is the one who take my BP and tell to the nurse “Ok, just write it…”, then they dismissed me and then I’m in the waiting area again, in the second check up it’s time for physical examination, facing the doctor in his desk says to me “Breath, inhale, exhale” using his stethoscope focusing it in my chest. He started to seriously face me and says “I hear something, a murmur”, then I was like “huh?... clueless… what is a murmur?, by the way”… at last maybe he can read my thoughts even I don’t say it loudly, he says “may tunog na “sssshhhh,sssshhhh,ssshhhhh,” sa heart mo at paulit-ulit”, then he says “don’t worry, I send the report of your medical to the company, you may know my verdict there so be there. ok?” and I just nodded.  

      Still don’t want to panic, I wait for the day of my verdict and then got the result and it was pending, yes! It was like “what on Earth is happening, I pass everything, the exam, the interview, the eye test and then this is the only one thing I should pass the medical exam then it was pending meaning I didn’t actually pass the medical”, the announcer suddenly says “there’s a note in my medical record “please see a specialist or doctor ASAP”, then I was like “huh? Wow! That is special, I have a note. I’m the only one who has a note then the announcer exclaimed and read the problem in my medical why it is pending “murmur heard in the left ventricle”, “oh! I hear it again”(saying only to myself) then the announcer continue “siguro sa mata ito”, I want to burst a loud laugh but I help it, “what? Why on Earth she think na sa mata un?” then I just want to get out to that place before I start to go crazy. First things first I talked to my parents, both “my father and my mother” then I found myself crying as if it was “devastating” on my part cause my effort is nothing “I don’t have the job and I found that there is something not normal in me”. Early morning the next day, me and my beloved mother go to that clinic and ask his opinion “he just repeat himself and explain to me, he cant take the risk of giving me the job if he know my health is not fit for it and that is his job as a doctor, he also told us to see a cardiologist. Then on our way home it was all over my mind, I’m still don’t know how to react, I just said to my mother “mag papa check up ako para malaman ko”, then I bow my head and I don’t feel bad, I feel sadden because I loose the job that I expected to have then I start to say a prayer “I hope it was not so bad… I hope it was not so bad… I hope it was not so bad… please… I hope it was not so bad… let it be not that worst God please”….

      And then my journey and discovery about this “murmur” thing starts, off course, I don’t have money for expensive check-ups that is why I needed job badly but in God grace I manage to win a job after months of rest and calm seas and when I save enough money I quit the job and do what I have to do. I spent the money that I earned only for check-ups, my beloved mother is always there to back me up and be with me. I go to the well renowned cardiologist in the town and have my first check up.  

         
         The ECG, Blood test, Thyroid test, Chest X-ray and finally 2D echo, that is the entire test I've been through but I’m fine with it. The cardiologist finally explain it to me using a heart model, open it up for me to see all the valve in the heart and my problem is the “mitral valve” the valve inside the heart, she explain it to me in the simplest possible way “the mitral valve surface is thickened that is why the blood that supposed to continue pass through it don’t pass through but instead push it back again until it pass thoroughly that is the reason why there is a “ssshhhh…sssshhhh…ssshhhh sounds or murmur” and you have to take some medication and consider some of my advice for you to handle your case. You just don’t have to worry in a very assuring voice. Then it came “norten,vastarel,lanoxin” 3 medicines in one day in different hours and I was like “Oh! Please… I don’t want medications”… but I have to get immune with it. Months pass still obediently taking all the medicines and then my cardio decided to drop “vastarel” and take only “lanoxin and norten” for my case is only mild. I smile “God hears my prayer” I ask for it, for me it is ok if I found out that my heart is not in normal state but I only wish it is something I can handle, something mild and I thank God it was. I wake up one day realizing that I’m being dependent in my medications, we have an electronic BP device in our home sent by my loving tita from States, I have the chance to use it, it will appear in the screen “the zigzag logo” if the heartbeat of your heart is irregular and even your pulse rate it was shown in the screen. My pulse rate always plays in “80 above”, it is all right, I can handle it, it was normal to me to have pulse rate like that, it is so much risky and dangerous for me if i hit “95 and above” that is the time I get numb and can’t move at all. It only happen to me one time when I get too tired and plus the fact that I ate delicious food “cholesterol food”, it is a “norm” for everybody, I guess, not eat cholesterol food so I don’t feel bad at all maybe the only thing that makes me feel sad is when I cant have as much as I want like other does.  

             
                DISCIPLINE that is, that is the great requirement in my case, then I decided to stop taking my “medicines” after my worst encounter one day, it is only a “minutes” late in the time I supposed to take my meds then from “calm beat” it starts to “get wild in a minute and wilder and the beat became faster as if I cannot contain it, I cannot breath. I calm myself drink lots of water and then lay a minute I mange to “blank” my mind and bring myself in the state of “nothingness” then I pray then I win. Yes! I manage to pass through that and I suddenly realize this time “I wont relay on meds anymore, I will work on my own, I will do all possible ways for me to handle my case without relying in the meds for the little hours that it can bring me calmness only few mistake that I missed to take it can lead my heart in a freaking state so if I only need calmness for me not to experience “chest pain” then I myself will give “myself” what exactly I needed, maybe as a human being I admit I’ am not perfect I loosen my control and there are times I’m carried away by my own anger to the negative people, events in my life but with God help and guidance and with a cool friends who can always be there for me, I’m at ease that I can continue my fight and win this endless battle that I know  within me I don’t only fight alone but with God and my loved ones to back me up… ^-^