Tag Archives: defibrillator

Holiday time…

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Hi all,

Happy Holidays to everyone and thanks for all the support!

The end of the year always seem to rush up on me, so here we are all of the sudden. I am taking a well needed break and get to spend some quality time with my family. I hope you all are doing something nice for yourselves and get some time to relax.

holiday time image

My new installements have been coming slower this past half year, due to me being more busy with my company, but I am aiming to balance things a bit differently in 2018. I guess I simply need to add more hours to the day. Overall, 2017 was a good year and I am looking forward to an exciting 2018.

Please stay in touch, hug each other and enjoy being alive!

Stefan

Here’s another dang post…

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Here’s another dang post. So I found out why people who subscribed to this page do not get any notifications when I post a new episode: it’s because I need to post something written here since apparently the subscriptions are tied to these posts. Could it be triggered from the comics, which would be ideal? Maybe, but I am not ready to dive into that technical morass and spend two days to find out.

So I found out why people who subscribed to this page do not get any notifications when I post a new episode: it’s because I need to write a dang post here since apparently the subscriptions are tied to these. Could it be triggered from the comics, which would be ideal? Maybe, but I am not ready to dive into that technical morass and spend two finding out.

Anyway, this is week #35, which means this has been going for almost nine months! Unbelievable. And I haven’t even got to the actual main surgery yet. It feels a bit like this will never end, but I enjoy doing it, so what the hey. I’ll get an intern if I lose my gusto.

The Fox sisters dang post

The Fox sisters.

I am still planning on publishing this in book form once I have gone through the whole story here online, but I have not yet approached any publishers about it. One reason is that I have not had the time. What do I do with all my time? Either work or look for work. They both take up a lot of hours :). Part of me also wonder who the hell is going to be willing to publish a story about a life-threatening illness? What kind of entertainment value does that hold? When people pick up a comic book they want to escape and perhaps laugh a bit, not getting slammed in the face with mortality! Stop bothering people! If you were a famous person it would be different, but you’re just a regular guy reminding us that we all will end up on a stretcher! Go away!

As true as that is I really don’t care and I have no interest in cutting myself short before I even try, so anytime soon now (soon, meaning sometime in the next year!) I will check out what options are out there. Maybe I can publish it as some kind of lightweight medical journal?

Anyway, I hope you’re all doing well and thanks for reading and supporting this project.

Shocker on bike.

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This week has the 100th frame in it!

This episode deals with the first time I received a real shock from my defibrillator. I remember getting it installed into my chest under my right clavicle. Normally they go under the left clavicle since that is a shorter distance to the heart where the two sensor strings will go, but being a lefty I asked to have it on the right to minimize strain and movement restriction on my main hand. After the surgery my shoulder was purple and blue and my arm was in a sling. I can’t remember if I had to stay overnight at the hospital but I think not. On the evening when I came home from the surgery I laid in bed reading the manual to the defibrillator and for some reason it felt really absurd to read a manual for such a serious medical device.

0104_ileftmy shocker

Either way, the manual talked about the different levels of shock that would be administered depending on the severity of the heart failure. For people who don’t know (and why should you?) the defibrillator sits in your body, monitoring your heart. If the heart starts beating slower than the pace you programmed it to, it will make it beat faster with the help of small electric shocks (like a pacemaker). If the heart starts galloping faster than the defibrillator was programmed to, it shocks the heart back into normal pace. It is the same procedure as you see on TV shows and movies about hospitals, where the nurse has two clothing iron-looking things in their hands that they put on the passed out patient’s chest and scream “Clear!” The manual told me that the highest level of shock administered felt like a horse kicked you in the chest! What a great evening read! The consolation was that apparently at that point, you’re in such a bad shape that you’ve already passed out. Phew… I guess.

The shock that happened in this episode was luckily the most severe I had to experience during my time wearing it, but it was enough. The best way to explain how it felt is “like being electrocuted”. I think I did a small jump on my bike and let out an involuntary “ugh!!!”. I could feel it in my jaw and all of the body. It really did feel like it came from the inside. After, I got off the bike, tried to calm down and walked very slowly the rest of the blocks home. My transplant buddy Mike said he got shocked constantly in the month before he had his surgery. I can’t imagine the edge he must have been on, walking around knowing he could have that terrible thing happen to him at any time throughout the day.

Have a great week everyone and thanks for coming here!

This story is just growing…

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Week #6!

It’s great to have come all the way here.

Last week we cleaned out our garage a bit and some old tidbits from this whole episode surfaced. Some old manuals, hospital forms and thick binders with information on how to survive and how to lead your life in the new health situation. Also, there were some journals from the time before and after the heart failure happened. Of course there were tons of I-have-to-add-this-to-the-story moments, to the point of me feeling like I need to structure this a bit more. Up until now it has been just me doing stick figure storyboarding a few pages ahead from what comes to mind, but as more material shows up in my memory or, for example Christine goes, “remember that funny moment”, I want to organize it all a bit. However, I don’t want to make this all too precious and get perfectionist  about it, because like the cartoonist Texan in Tokyo so correctly put it: “finished is better than perfect” (2:49). A large part of the fun is to be able to put stuff together, thrash forward on gut feeling and try different things out.

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The garage finds were also a much needed reminder of what a miracle it all is. Life is precious.

This week’s installment ended up having lots of text in it, so it’s basically like a REAL BOOK!

Hope you’re all well and thanks for reading!