Widowmaker and other Heart Problems Club

Let’s see, Spring of 2010, started experiencing fatigue and had a hard time doing stairs. Went to Springfling in May and was having trouble just walking short distances. Got home several days later, went to my regular doc and he got me into the heart center. Went to the cath lab and they found three arteries blocked, widow maker at 95%. Went ahead with the stent. Put on Plavix.

6 months later went to Fall Fling. The day after the show I’m unloading my trailer at the Pomona swap. Start having chest pressure. I stop, rest and it goes away. I call my two buds who are at the entrance to the swap. Tell them, they freak out but I explained I’ve had this before. Went ahead and walked the swap. As long as I walked fairly slow I was ok. I called my wife who’s a nurse and told her. She was visiting our son who was two hours south. Told her to pack her bags and I’ll be down to pick her up. I didn’t want to get into a LA third world hospital so we made the trip back to WA. We mapped out all the cardiac hospitals along the way just in case.

Got home 20 hours later, parked the truck and trailer, jumped in my wife’s car and off to the ER. THE visit to the ER is another story. Anyway, the ER doc contacted my cardiologist and I was admitted and sent off to the cath lab. Got stent #2

2015 moved to Mesa, AZ. All is well until the fall of 2017. Went out one morning to clean up after the dogs when I started having actual chest pains. Told my wife and off to the ER. Once again admitted and sent to the cath lab. They went in and found another blockage in the widow maker.
So, They did aanother stent, #3 and kept me on Plavix fo another year. The doc told me that this blockage was more extensive than the first. However, he found where my body created its own bypass around the blockage and allowed just enough blood to bypass. The human body is amazing.

It’s now 2021 and so far, knock on wood things are going good.