"Cuando tienes una duda; pides una segunda o tercera opinion"

Carta al cardiologo: "Que nos enseñaron en Estados Unidos"

Cuando tienes una duda; buscas segundas y terceras opiniones... ¿sabes que significa tener una duda? Es natural... Algo que me dijó el doctor o la literatura cientifica hace en mi mente una duda... Le digo al doctor y tal vez le quita la duda con su estilo de responderme o le hace más fuerte la duda...


Tuve una duda de que "causó" el supuesto infarto de 12 de Marzo... Entonces pregunte, escuche, investigé, comenté, escuche la respuestas, apunte un historial impresionante de todo que pasaba en el día desde principios de Junio y entiendo varias cosas relacionadas con mi "hipertensión" que dijo la Dra. Brennan se llama "Hipertensión Reactiva"... Es decir, es occasional y no es permanente y no tiene nada que ver con lipidos y colesterol... y no se trata con anti-hipertensivos por ser algo fugaz...


Pero, durante los 3 meses de apuntes y vigilancia, veo que no solo trata de "hipertensión reactiva"... Se trata de algo en el musculo de la carne roja... Tuve la duda desde antes Marzo que comer mucha carne de res o borrego por una temporada prolongada de 1-3 días se elevaba la presión sanguinea. Entonces, hice la prueba... Que encontré es que subía la presión en solamente unas horas después de haber comido musculo de res o borrego... Es decir, si tengo la presión a 115/75 a la 1pm cuando como birria, veo una subida de presión a las 4pm en el rango de 135/85... Y si paso el siguiente día sin comer proteína animal, se normaliza mi presión el día pasado... Lo mismo va con comer pescado... Si fuera por colesterol o grasa saturada, la respuesta sería mucha más lenta (es una cuestión entre tiempo lento de acumulo y tiempo rapido de inflamación).


Bajo la presión en minutos... Igual, puede subir la presión en minutos. Pero, no sube por consumir yogurt, huevos, mantequilla o aceite de coco...


Una cosa más: Dra. Brennan (a quien solo vi una ves con el Dr. Solorzano) había pedido un ecocardiograma... Muy caro haber pagado tanto para que se falla el tecnico... Se quedo sorprendido la Dra. a ver que no mostraba huella de un infarto previo... Pero, mostraba hipertensión pulmonar moderado (es decir no tan leve)... que no mostraba tanto en el eco antes del angiogramo de 14 de Marzo. Ahora, si tengo hipertensión pulmonar moderado, debo sentir problemas con la respiración cada vez subo la escalera a nuestra recamara... También, debo sentir sin aire cuando camino o cuando estoy corriendo los 5+ kms 37.5 minutos... o cuando hago mis largatijas rapidas (64 la otra noche) o cuando uso la remadora intensa durante 30 minutos...


Sientas que estoy peleando contigo... Pero, no, estoy tratando protegerme, entenderla situación y mejorar mi salud...


Y mejor preguntas, "Ross, por qué apareciste otra vez si no estás de acuerdo conmigo y solo quieres discutir conmigo?"


La respuesta es así Doctor: Pusiste dos stents en mi corazon... Eres responsable por haber puesto los dos stents... Sabes que no puedes decir cuando o si iban ser obstruidas las otras dos arterias (uno de 90% y el otro de 50% si estoy correcto). Pero, sí sabes que dicen de los stents y el riesgo de que se obstruyen tomando aspirina y Effient... y que después de un año, no sirve tomar Effient (aunque no explican porque no)...


En tratar un riesgo, se construye otro riesgo... tal vez mayor...


Doctor, yo puedo cuidar mi presión, mi inflamación, mi ejercicio, mi estrés/relajación, la intensidad de mi vida y mi ciclo de dormir. Puedo tomar Effient y Aspirina la cantidad de tiempo necesario. Pero, que no puedo cuidar es si tapaste totalmente bien la placa con el stent y si el stent (por su naturaleza) va ser obstruido hoy o en 5 años... Pero, no puedes decirme que no voy necesitar otro angioplasty o cirugia en el futuro cercana...


Dr. Solorzano me había dicho que tengo que bajar la sal... Y le mostré los examines de sangre... Y dijo él a la Dra. Brennen "su sal está baja!"... Y sí mi sodio está abajo el rango, aunque no tan bajo que se afecta mi cerebro...


A veces tengo antojos fuertes de chatarra... Pero, como no como harina de trigo y evite las grasas transgenicas, no puedo consumir que es lo más facíl para subir el sodio... Cocino casi todo que comemos... Y cocino con sal. Y parece que pongo puñadas de sal (mido con los dedos o la mano, no con cucharitas)... Pero, no puedo hacer que sale salada que cocino (¡que bueno!). Uso sal de mar (sin yodo) desde Marzo... Es porque tome el yodo en Junio (por creer que la fatiga fue por falta de yodo)...


En las temporadas de subida de presión (por estrés, desvelo o demasiado carne roja), tomar Vitamina D 50,000IU baja la presión... Comer muchos platanos baja la presión. Tomar Jamaica mantiene estable la presión...


Apartir de anoche empecé preparar un vaso grande de agua de Jamaica con una cuchara de azucar, uno o dos "pizcas" de sal, y 6 cucharas de linaza molida para ganarla fibra (para no perder tan rapido el agua y ganar Omega 3) como una bebida deportiva. Tengo periodos de palpitaciones... que ahora entiendo por un inbalance de electrolitas... 2 semanas durante el trabajo muy pesado en San Luis Potosi y apenas empezó otra vez con correr dos días seguidas. La presión ha estado normal-baja (117/77--103/73).


Voy repetir: mi preocupación no es la hipertensión ni el atherosclerosis. Mi preocupación son los stents y cuando va venir el stenosis...


Dos cosas más:


1) Pedí de Estados Unidos una evaluación genetica que dice que tengo una mutación al gene ACE que significa tomar inhibadores de ACE puede causar angio-edema. No me importa mucho por solo tomar Captopril 2 veces desde la madrugada en el hospital en Junio...


Que más me llama atención es la mutación genetica que causa un desperdicio fuerte de la hormona "vitamina" D: sube la presión, tomo la vitamina D y se normaliza... Le dije de la deficiencia de Vitamina D y hipertensión al cardiologo hace casi 3 años y me dijo que no es asunto suyo y buscar una internista... Hipertensión sí es el asunto de los cardiologos y si es causado por una dificiencia de vitamina D... también subir los niveles de Vitamina D es asunto de los cardiologos.


2). Pedí de Estados Unidos una prueba de toxicidad. Salio alto niveles de Mercurio (plomo, alumninio)... La nivel de Mercurio que tuve en el fin de Junio incrementa el riesgo de infarto agudo miocardio 30%... Tambien, aluminio y mercurio bloquea el procesimiento de Zinc. Mi nivel de Zinc es baja.


Mi nivel de Yodo estaba al cielo... Lleve a San Luis Potosi sal de Mar de Colima (sin Yodo)... Se acabó y estaba yo cocinando con sal yodada... A la vez tuve fuertes antojos de salado y estaba yo comprando semillas de girasol muy saladas... en los mismos días empezaron las arrhitmias en la noche... Imaginé fueron causados por el yodo... Las arritmias aumentaron durante 2 semanas hasta no solo las tuve en la noche pero en la mañana también y después hasta correr en medio de la tarde... Se quitaron a regresar a Guadalajara. Pensamos que fue por tanto desgaste. Pero, también pensamos que fue por salitre en los cuartos que rentamos aya... 

Cuando regresé de San Luis Potosi, hice una examinación de sangre... mi sodio estaba 135 (rango es 136-145) aunque consumí mucha sal supuestamente las semanas anteriores...

Esta es la historia... A ver si me contestas... o me contestas con calma...

Dietas y una carta a mi Endocrinologa

1) no como papas, tostadas, birotes/harina de trigo, arroz, pasta/harina de trigo, mayonesa/productos con soya... 

   a) la mayor cantidad de calorias en tú dieta proviene de los carbohidratos refinados... es decir que tendria que aumentar otra cosa (como frijoles o aguacate o nueces)... y no quiero entrar en esto tipo de matematica... 

      1. no todas las calorias son iguales, no todas las grasas se metabolizan igual gramo por gramo

2) mi especialidad por 25 años ha sido comida internacional (y ha sufrido bastante mi "cocina" con mi dieta sin carbohidratos refinados o sin soya...; no puedo cocinar mayor parte de comidas Asiaticas [china, koreana, tialandes, vietnamita, "hindu", Persica...], "arabes"/turqos [la base es pan plano o pan "libones"] o Italiana [la base es de pastas].  Margarita y yo hemos pasado nuestros 12 años trabajando juntos en la cocina...  Nuestra dieta es pan-Mexicana/pan internacional...y no tenemos costumbres "tapatías"... Es decir, no entiendo mucho la idea comer mucho que existe en la dieta... como, fue la primera vez leer la palabra "Chabela"... Y se que cuando dice "Pico de Gallo" no es el pico de gallo del centro del pais o de Veracruz que es la mezcla de jitomate, cebolla, ajo, jalapaño (o serrano), cilantro y limon... No se come solo.  Tú pico de gallo tiene que ser la ensalada de guayaba con cebolla, serano y limon, que siempre prepara amigos Tapatíos... Siento que, para mi, la dieta causaría más confusión que ayuda... Es como dice a sus alumnos medicos, Ibn Sina (Avicena) para ayudar sanar sus pacientes:  "Primero tienes que entender sus culturas y costumbres antes de ofrecerles comida que puede matarle aunque a gente de nuestra ciudad, la ayudará sanar..."  Es decir que alguien quien no tiene costumbre tomar leche, no va bajar lacteos...  La dieta está llena de carbohidratos refinados como base... Los llamo "llenadores" de panza...  

3) en los ultimos 2 años ha salido mucha información en contra de los carbohidratos refinados en la producción de trigliceridos y VLDL colesterol y que las dietas bajas en grasa causan más daño que ayudan... y NUNCA ha sido comprobado que funcionan para bajar el peso... A la vez, han comprobado que el ejercio tampoco ayuda mucho para bajar el peso... Y fue comprobado en la experiencia de Margarita y yo...  Practico ejercicio para mejorarla circulación sanguinea, para oxigenarlas cellulas, para relajarme y para mejor funcionamiento cerebral/mental...  Para bajar peso?  Absolutamente no... Imaginalo:  bajar hacia el rio en la Barranca de Huentitan 5 veces por semana (50 minutos hacia abajo; 70 minutos hacia arriba), no bajamos más que 3 kilos en 5 meses... La dieta fue casi vegetariano, baja en grasa.  Los lacteos fueron limitados a queso panela y requeson... aunque restringida porque tiene problemas con lacteos Margarita...  El problema fue nuestro alto consumo de pan, arroz y tortillas...  La fotografia de mi que te enseñe fue tomada en la misma temporada... y hay más:  despues de la temporada de la barranca de Huentitan (ocupó demasiado tiempo del día), cambie a corridas en el Parque Metropolitano 6 días por semana entre 30 y 40 minutos/3.4 - 4 kms por corrida...  No baje kilos... 

4) como estoy metido en cuestiones de "celiac" y IBD (intestino inflamado; mio es inflamación del J-Pouch o Pouchitis), preparo mis propios pro-bioticos (dice Yakult "sin azucar" aunque la lista de ingredientes dice sucrosa, dextrosa y...otro y es horriblimente dulce; no entiendo que lo deja mentir tanto Profeco) en forma de fermentados (col, pepinos, Kim Chi, cebollas...)

5) y como estoy metido en cuestiones de nutrición, no puedo limitarme a unas recetas de una dieta.  Es decir:  muy alta en grasa son los aguacates.  Pero ha sido comprobado que consumir aguacates (como los nueces) causa un bajada de peso...  Igual ha sido comprobado el consumo de yogurt natural...  Supuestamente, el aceito de coco causa un aumento metabolico, aunque es grasa saturada... y el acido butirico (encontrada en la mantequilla de vaca...) es la grasa quemada más rápida por el cuerpo... Es decir que no quedaría en el cuerpo para causar engordamiento...  PERO, los "azucares" no metabolizado, no quemado, se convierten en trigliceridos en el higado para almacenarlos en el tejido adiposo...  

6) Aveces, que parece "lógico" no es lógico y que parece ilógico es la verdad...  

Cuando pido libros relacionados con la salud publicados en Estados Unidos o Europa, siempre pido conseguirlos en Español, para que los pueden leer Margarita, mis cuñados o amigos Mexicanos... Pero, ¿sabes que? los únicos libros "medicos" traducidos en Español son los que vendieron millones de copias al publico; los "best sellers de New York Times"...  ¿Sabes que significa ésto?  Que, su información es leído y vendido facilmente... Es decir que la información puede ser muy cuestionable...  ¿Sabes cuantos libros esos tengo que "escondí" por tener energia de charlatanes?  Dr. Sears... y su grasa tóxica...  En Terranova existe un restaurante que se llama "La dieta de Dr. Sears."  Y que verguenza... que la gente no sentia la energia de charlatan en su libro, ni levantaba las contradicciónes y mentiras flagrantes en el libro... Lo siguiente seria hacer investigaciones para comprobar sus ideas "cientificas", que no existen y despues leer (en Inglés) que dicen los criticadores o los investigadores del biografia/historial de los negocios inventados de Dr. Sears, que dicen sus socios... Y con esto, sabemos que su libro extramadamente popular y traducido en Español es puro basura...  

Lo mismo va los productos "sin-gluten"...  Tambien existe en Terranova una panaderia "sin-gluten"... No hemos entrado por no querer entrar en los mismos habitos de consumer demasiados carbohidratos refinados y sucrosa o fructosa (aunque no sube la glucosa, si aumenta riesgos de diabetes y Higado Graso no Alcoholico; miel de agave para la diabetes?  Es el gran engaño a los pobres diabeticos)...  La mayor parte de los celiacos o de intolerancia a gluten o a trigo no entienden que tienen problemas con la proteina zein en Maiz... Comer maiz por un periodo de unas semanas (como pasó cuando fuimos al rancho de mis suegros en Diciembre) me causo la misma experiencia que me causaba trigo... Creia que fue mezclado con harina de trigo la masa de maiz de los tamales o de las tortillas que comiamos... Pero, todos dijieron que no...  Regresando a Guadalajara me metí en una investigando empezando con las compañias Maseca y Minsa... Todos diciendo que su harina de maiz es libre de trigo...  Despues, hubo publicado quejas de Mexicanos o Chicanos a Americanos-Mexicanos en California de que con Celiac no pueden comer tortillas de maiz en los restaurantes Mexicanos... creendo que las tortillas de maiz fueron mezclados con harina de trigo... Puede ser, para darlas más flexibilidad... hacerlas más suaves...  Y en fin, la organización de Celiaquia de Sonora publico una noticia que dice que 50% de los celiacos tienen problemas con la proteina zein de maiz... Y ahora entiendo que pasa con mi panza cuando como maíz seguido...  

Tarda un día (3 comidas seguidas) en tener una reacción a cerdo.

Tarda 30 minutos o menos tener un dolor en la cabeza o cualquiere producto de soya... No más barras de chocolate amargo o sem-amargo Turin...

Tarda como 3--7 días de comer maíz (tortillas, elote/esquite, tamales) en todas las comidas para empezar tener problemas digestivas...  

No he comprobado con trigo... No quiero para nada.  Quitarlo hace 15 meses se quito la nececidad de correr al baño... Puedo dormir toda la noche sin levantar irme al baño minimo 3 veces entre 1am y las 5am...  No tengo la sensación de necesitar usar el baño con pocos resultados para volver tener ir al baño con pocos resultados...  

7) Si fuera yo alguien con un cuerpo/sistema digestivo típico y gustos culinarios típico y mente más "tradicional", seguramente seria funcional tú dieta.  Pero, desgraciadamente, no cupo yo en los espacios cuadrados de tú dieta...

Espero que no sientas muy ofendida por mi correo... 

Killing me softly with his song... killing me softly... with his song...

"I had the feeling that regardless what we did, the stents would fill up anyway.  But, what could I do?  This is what they taught us... It was the correct procedure...  Now to sweep it under the rug and continue on."

And what can you do?  You, the patient, are the only one who lives with your experience... No matter how well intentioned are the other people... the doctors, they'll never near understanding your concerns, what you are feeling...  how this affects your perspective on the future, your plans...

Some people think that it is as simple as saying, "relax, distract yourself... seek fun"...  

But, what they don't understand is that every step must be planned... so as not to make a mistep...  Plus, it is not only about what I feel, but about what Margarita feels...

Truthfully, I have no idea just how exhausted she is or how much she can take...  

For me, exercise was a great part of maintaining mental health, for preventing depression... for being positive... Afterall, my state of mind affects that of others and the reflection of how my state of mind affect others, affects me...  But, at this moment I'm concerned about increasing my heart rate...  

When I had my colon removed at the age of 13, I was participating in an event that was meant towards prolonging my life or ridding me of a very heavy experience...  

When I had my rectum removed and the part of my ileum turned into the J-Pouch, I was taking my future into my hands and preventing imminent death... in the words of the surgeon.

However, when I had the stents placed in my two heart arteries, I was only doing what supposedly was the only option... the only "logical" response... Later on I learned that maybe stent placement wasn't the only option, and may not have been the most helpful one... You can look at all of the scientific studies on bare metal stents and medicated stents and you'll realize that the mortality risk continues basically the same... if not increases...  Truthfully, regarding health and stent placement, there are no outcome studies to tell you if something was truly prevented or if quality of life changes for the patient...  But, we do know that the risk of death while having the stents in the coronary arteries is very high...

When I had my colon removed, Doctor Decosse told us that the rectal polyps would disappear and that we didn't have to worry anymore.  And we believed him... And we could rest and relax, although that wasn't in the least bit true.  However, when you have a heart attack, you cease being able live normally.  You can't remove the problem as they did with my colon or with my rectum or with appendix or as they wanted to do with my gallbladder... Once it's gone, no more worries...

The heart on the other hand must remain... So what do you do with it if it has problems?  What if one of those problems is a implanted "technology", a foreign object that hasn't been verified as truly helpful?  

And then I ask, "Isn't this besides the point?"

And I never manage to write successfully what was on my mind or what I was feeling that inspired me to write on the blog...  

I want to jump on the rowing machine, to do push-ups... But the events since Friday have me a bit frightened...  And, the cardiologist doesn't take any of this very seriously.  Or maybe that really isn't the case... Maybe the case is that he always was powerless to understand and change the situation.  He's "of service to..." but his services are limited to...  

A heart attack is the beginning of the end, even if the person may live for decades beyond the original event.  But, we'll always be wondering... worrying... when? 

But, if the arrythmias (palpitations/pauses) continue along with sensations of angina... ?  Constant reminders that at any moment...  Hoping that the "slip, sliding, away" isn't part of tonight's (last night's) experience... 

I don't cry... I felt the crying two days ago when José and Mary visited us... But I didn't...  Cry...  Why not?  I don't see how it will improve the situation...  We've gotta live with this anyway...  The countdown...  

How about if I ignore it all?  And return to my prior habits... What prior habits?  Exercising as intensely as I wish, drinking coffee...  It was one of things I enjoyed doing...  Truthfully, I like the ever evolving diet...  We've virtually removed all chicken and beef and have substituted it with fish... I'm glad to have changed my eating habits...  

But, maybe I should just let this thing kill me...  as it seems it wishes...  

The cardiologist won't ask for blood tests... He won't call me to ask when I'm coming back to his office... He didn't suggest any return time after seeing me in the hospital Sunday...  As Margarita said, "don't say anything about the exams or what you discovered... He won't be asking...  In fact, he's not thinking about you if you aren't communicating with him."  But, I still sent him the information and the lab results.  Why not?  Who does it hurt?

Did you know that mercury in fish increases cardiovascular risk?  Can you measure the amount of mercury in a filet of fish?  

Did you know that mercury in fish has no effect upon cardiovascular health?  So it doesn't matter how much mercury is in that filet of fish...

Two scientific studies on fish consumption and cardiovascular risk that contradict one another... And, I wonder, was the Harvard study biased by the Boston or New England fishing industry?  How can you know?  Just as how can you know just how many of the pharmaceutical studies are biased by the pharmaceautical industry?

And this doesn't matter now, since I have the pharmaceutical and medical technology industries permanently inserted within my heart...  So, I've just gotta accept it...  

Last night I spent the night practicing breathing exercises due to a reoccurance of arrythmias after taking the Effient...  Like yesterday morning, this morning I awakened with discomfort in my back behind my heart that radiates towards my left kidney... I also have discomfort in my left shoulder...  

I told my cardiologist about this yesterday morning... and he responded that it isn't a problem as long as I don't feel it in my jaw, as I had on the 12th of March...  

Is that correct?  Is that what the Mayo Clinic and the American Heart Association says about the various forms of angina?

But, I can't ask for a consult with the cardiologist every time I feel something worrisome, nor can I admit myself to a hospital... for "nothing"...  Which creates an incredible sense of helplessness... like saying, there approaches a heart attack or worse, (since Sunday and Monday's experiences were worse than the heart attack of March 12th.  Much worse...) and we're just gonna let it come... 

And maybe that's all we can do... So, maybe I should just jump on the rowing machine and row, row, row...  

Rupture in the Hour Glass

When we were breakfasting at 12:30pm, José "Montaña" sent Margarita a message asking her what our plans were for my birthday and I responded that at this moment I couldn't plan for my birthday... that I had just had a very bad experience the past few days...  So, he and Mary came over...  

What I believe you don't understand (nor does the cardiologist) is that, although I am alive today, both nights I felt my life slipping away...  I didn't feel that on March 14th with the reaction to the image resonance ink...the convulsions and my heart rate going from 68 to 200. Nor did I feel that on Mercer Street that summer in 1988...  As I said to José, it's as if that space between the two sides of the hour glass widened, allowing the sand to drain at an unprecedented rate.  It was a different type of falling...  If the ambulance didn't come fast enough... But, the ambulance wasn't going to come fast enough... It was too late...

Monday night, the breathing exercises didn't work.  Infact, they made my hands become numb...  I became very cold.  Margarita had to wrap me in blankets...  She said that holding my hands was like holding her 87-year-old grandfather's hands the month before he died.  

But you are only 45-years-old! How can this be happening to you?

José says that the problem I have is that my heart has always been too big... That I've always worried too much about the injustices that other people suffer... That I want to help people with the information that I obtain.  But no one wants to listen...  I absorb the pain others feel or I feel too much pain from the injustices I see...  In turn, my heart gets damaged...  

It's a poetic interpretation.  

He supposedly sees spirits or ghosts... maybe it's because he is blind in one eye (two failed cornea transplants)...  At the moment that Margarita wrote him to come over, he says he was visited by a woman... He says that the woman was related to me...  In our house he said that she was with him again...  He says that it was your mother.  Now why would your mother visit us?  Almost 8 years earlier, when we first met, he said that he was visited by your father...

Some time during the visit, he asked me to sit down in one of our sofa chairs, relax and close my eyes.  He did something with chimes from one air to the other... And then I thought he had his hand over my head... and then I thought he had something hot next to my left air, like the flame of a candle or a light bulb.  And that heat continued next to my ear until the exercise ended... (long after he had sat down to observe me) so did that sensation of a hand directly over my head... But suddenly I heard his footsteps moving away from me.  But, the sensation continued over my head...  It turns out that he was sitting in the love seat facing/observing me and my painting of the trees behind me the whole time.  He said that normally the son's faces look more like their mothers, than their fathers... But, with my head tilted slightly backwards, he was seeing my father more than my mother... and that my father gave me the energy to accomplish what he couldn't accomplish...  But that I was hurting myself because I couldn't take a break from the investigations and worrying about others...  that I needed to take a break... and that he needed me to bury him one day...  During the time in the chair, I fell asleep momentarily and I heard someone in the briefest dream say "pinche Joe"...  And I wondered who was Joe...  They weren't talking about José because no one knows José as Joe...  Joe Stankevitz?  I doubt it... And I wondered what other Joe's I've known in my life... And then I remembered Aunt Jo...  A moment later, I felt a strange tremor/sudden shaking in my chest, like that strange mattress jumping feeling that occurs sometimes right after you fall asleep.  And, suddenly light seemed to shine on me... But, more like as if the person standing next to me had moved away allowing the light from the window or the sky to reach me, removing their shadow...  And I asked if the sun had come out momentarily and José, Mary, and Margarita all said that it has been the same cloudy sky as always... and that José has been sitting in the love seat the whole time...  

José asked me also if I had felt pain in my left ear the past few days.  I responded no... So he asked me if I had felt pain in my left shoulder... And I said, "Yes, yesterday I awakened with pain in my left shoulder"... And chose to ignore it or hope that it was from the rowing maching workout Sunday afternoon...  And he said that he had been sensing this about me earlier...  

I wasn't frightened by the heart attack or the experience in the hospital March 14th... I was de-animated...  I was frustrated...  So, I waged a war against the situation.  I refused to be apathetic...  I had to prove that there was a misinterpretation of what had just occurred.  It just didn't make sense.  I knew it was something else and I had to figure out how to recuperate the project that was momentarily interrupted...  The cardiologist showed absolutely no signs of being able to help me with my concern.  So, I must seek the information and the tools outside of his consulting office...  And that's what I did for 3.5 months... And I educated myself on aspects of health and the body I previously had no inspiration for learning about... About heart attacks and atherosclerosis and all possible causes... 

In the process, something went wrong.

Wrong with my procedure?  Wrong with my behavior?

When I visited with the wonderful Endocrinologist on Monday, she said, "Wow! You really came prepared!"  Meaning that I greatly understood metabolic issues or processes... Meaning that we could have a conversation without her having to explain everything in detail...  I showed her the photo taken of me before removing the refined carbs

With my inlaws working in our coffee bar in May, and on the beach in Sayulita 2 years earlier

etc and explained that Margarita (who was there with us in the consultation room) lost the same amount of weight in the same time... and she, the endocrinologist exclaimed, "You look so much older in the photo!  The two of you really are gorgeous!  That's really impressive what you were able to do for the two of you!"  

I hadn't consulted with a dietician or a nutritionist or a gym trainer for changing our diet and lifestyle... In fact, I had been investigating and investigating to no avail for quite a while before discovering the idea about changing our diet... The idea came from various sources... And I molded our diet around what I felt sounded logical and what didn't sound logical... which led us to removing all wheat products, all refined carbs, most sugar, 99% of industrial vegetable/seed oils, all alcohol, most canned goods, most jarred goods...  Most commercially packed meats and cheeses, including sandwhich meats (includes bacon, hotdogs)...  I didn't start taking supplements until after my heart attack... Truthfully, I didn't believe in them...

Yes, you heard me correctly, I didn't believe in them...  

But, tell me, how do you come to believe or disbelieve in things?  Why do you believe in God?  And why did I just spell the word with a capital G?

I wasn't going to write because of concern about the stress it causes me...  and I just felt a strange fleeting discomfort in my throat...  But that's all that was, no?  We've gotta believe in something... or not believe...  

The events of this past weekend (4 days) have left me shell-shocked.  On Monday I wrote on my Facebook wall, "I almost died last night. But I didn't... Now I'm "afraid of the dark"... I had no idea that we would repeat the experience that night... 

But I was writing about believing in things... wasn't I?  

What I believed about Margarita and my future the day before the heart attack changed greatly after the heart attack... However, although I became disanimated about planning for the future after the heart attack, I still believed there was time for understanding what had actually happened.  It required a lot of work; a lot of investigations and learning about heart attacks and artery health or illness... how you prevent future heart attacks, if that is possible...  

Do you know that heart disease etc medications only prevent heart attacks in the first 6 months?  That over a 5 year period, the control groups end up having basically the same outcomes as the medicated groups?

So, what do we do with this problem?  

We try to figure out if having a heart attack truly means that we are worse off today than we were yesterday...?  Maybe so if I'm understanding the risks that come with having placed medicated stents placed in your heart arteries...  Who knows?  Maybe without the stents, it is possible to recover from a heart attack and be healthier tomorrow than we are today... But, pharmaceuticals do not do that for you.  They address the symptoms and not the causes...

Supposedly, if you understand the cause and if you understand the healing capacities of your body, if you are willing to hurt your body less through your lifestyle and habits and try giving it what it needs to function better, to heal itself, you can live as if you hadn't been seriously ill or damaged before...  And that was the premise of my work the past 3.5 months...  

No one was helping me.  The cardiologist NEVER asked for one blood exam during this period... He never asked me for my and my family's health history...  He didn't know that I had a history of asthma or allergies (especially to aspirin) before prescribing what he prescribed... And, when I told him about that history, he said that he didn't believe it really mattered... But if you look up the reasons why you shouldn't take the beta blocker Lobivon on Drugs.com, you'll read "If you have asthma or if you ever had asthma, you shouldn't take this"...  

Why not doctor?

But that's besides the point... and it seems that I'm rambling on...  

History changes itself...  Memories are conveniently erased.  Responsibilities become nullified or obselete when the person dies... And the whole mess is left to be disposed of by those left behind...  

Sunday night, Margarita and I went to bed... And we made beautiful love... Passionate love...  

}I'm prude... Always have been.  So, I feel embarrassed writing this... Although it's the truth and a very important detail for understand changes in events.  

And we fell asleep afterwards...  

I suddenly awakened with the need to go to the bathroom, but at the moment of lifting up my torso, I felt a pause in my heart... (Friday night I was awakened from sleep with my first bout of palpitations.  Every time I fell asleep, I would be awakened by a palpitation... I would awaken gulping for air seemingly in the hope that immediately inhailing would prevent the heart from stopping permanently.  It was a very frightening experience and had me in a panic for at least three hours while Margarita slept alongside me.  I practiced breathing exercises in order to keep the palpitations under control until I could fall back asleep)... so I lay back down and practiced my breathing exercises... but the palpitations continued coming, one after the other... And I felt my heart rate increase dramatically... and my hands became numb... and my tongue became dry... and I looked at Margarita asleep at my side and entered into a drastic debate with myself about whether or not should I awaken her... And I felt too weak to raise myself out of bed... And I suddenly concluded that I must awaken her, only to be fair.  So, I tapped on her shoulder.  My voice was very faint and I asked her to turn on the light... And with all the force I could muster, I made her understand that she should call the cardiologist... that we were in a grave situation... and that the ambulance wouldn't come on time...  

You have no idea... how it felt with my heart pumping increasingly faster... out of control..,. 

Out of control... It's as if we were two separate entities, my heart and my mind and body...  It was a train out of control...  And you still don't understand what I'm trying to share with you...  There would come a moment that, if I couldn't make my heart slow down, it would suddenly break.  But, this time, truly break...  overheat, burn out... Like an engine over-reved...  Pop! or Poof!, the engine block split... the food processor or blender won't turn on again...

Somehow I managed to sit up in bed... Maybe Margarita helped me sit up...  I managed to walk over to the sofa in our bedroom... And I managed to lower my pulse...  And I managed to walk downstairs and out the door and meet the paramedics...  who said that my blood/oxigen levels were perfect... from the breathing exercises... and that my BP was too close to normal for them to take me to the hospital...  That I should call a taxi.  I guess my breathing exercises worked wonders.  But, when I reached the hospital, my BP was supposedly at 189/115... so what happened between the visit with the Red Cross Ambulance Crew and the hospital? The ECG reading was normal... there was no sign of changes in my heart since the heart attack.  I hadn't had a heart attack...  Truthfully, I was left a bit frustrated and confused...  Especially since I found myself in a much closer near death experience than when I had the allergic reaction to the image resonance ink during the angiogram and stent placement March 14th...  And we went home... 5am and we didn't sleep... And we walked to the laboratory briskly as if we had drunk a few cups of strong coffee... at 8am and had blood tests done...  And didn't really sleep during the day... Met with the wonderful Endocrinologist that evening who sent me away with more tests to be done... I took my meds at around 9:45pm that night and proceeded to read the Pearl S. Buck book I was reading... but the palpitations came... And I went down to the kitchen to take my blood pressure and continue with the breathing exercises... 

At 2am Margarita awakened to find me at the computer writing certain people preparing for the event of my sudden death... Better than their not knowing why I stopped communicating... And I explained to Margarita what was occurring...  This time my heart rate was normal... But, my BP was rising rapidly... and breathing exercises didn't rid me of the palpitations or lower the blood pressure... and I started becoming very cold...  Margarita wrapped me in blankets, prepared me hot tea with cinnamon and cardomom and suggested I eat something... Recently I had read that cinnamon lowers BP... I had known about the BP lowering properties of Cardomom for a while... And had just read that Cayenne Pepper is used as one of the most effective natural ways of preventing a heart attack in the moment... So I told Margarita to bring me the Cayenne Pepper and a spoon...and proceeded to place spoonfuls of cayenne pepper in my mouth that I moistened with water...  Margarita also brought me a bucket and the hospital urinal..., since I suddenly developed a great urge to drink water and the need to urinate repeatedly... as if my body was trying to clean itself of something... (before ingesting the cayenne pepper). Afterall, I usually have difficulty urinating (not by blockage or kidney disease, but due to not having a colon or a rectum, nothing is reabsorbed in my non-existent colon).  

At 3am my blood pressure was 189/125...  At 9:30pm it had been at 125/85...Truthfully, I don't know how much higher it would go... I didn't want to know... I just sat there and tried breathing correctly.  But the breathing exercises caused my hands to become numb and I felt a strange warming sensation travelling down my arms... Margarita says that my hands and feet were horribly cold... So she started massaging my feet...  Fortunately, the cayenne pepper, cinnamon and cardomom dropped my BP to 140/89 by 5am... and I decided we could try and sleep... hoping that the palpitations wouldn't return upon laying down... And fortunately I was able to sleep undisturbed until 10am...

Today we basically know what caused the problem...  But I won't go into that...  My thyroid tests come back before Saturday... So, we'll have an idea how close I was to understanding the cause of the original heart attack... We're leaning towards a metabolic/hormonal/endocrine "disorder" and so far away from a question of diet and lifestyle... Meaning...

Why do you believe in what you believe?  Is it from personal experience?  Or is it because of what others have told you?  

When you experience your life slipping away so quickly and suddenly... out of the blue... and it occurs unexplained and two nights in a row... awakening you from your sleep, making you afraid to lay your head on the pillow and close your eyes... What will you believe in?

Death?  

Should we believe in death?

Before my heart attack and afterwards, I believed greatly in myself... I had learned to believe in myself through personal experience and impressive achievement against all odds the 12 years I'm living with and married to Margarita here in Mexico...  

But, my experience Sunday night and Monday night makes my belief in myself horribly irrelevent...  

And what if I hadn't learned about the cayenne pepper, cinnamon and cardomom for Monday night?  What if I hadn't learned about the breathing exercises for Sunday night?

What would have happened?

No need for believing in yourself if you are dead...  

And the cardiologist can't explain what happened the other nights... He doesn't know.  But, I will explain it to him... And he will understand later...  Why?  I didn't study medicine.  

The problem is that regardless of understandings or beliefs, we are racing against a clock... that seemingly speeds up with age.  But, the clock turned into a surreal hourglass and has shown me that at any given moment, it will suddenly decide to empty itself... regardless of what any of us understand or believe.

2nd half of "in the end" that I will keep as a draft

At this moment, I'm writing due to the fear of dying...  If I close my eyes, my heart will stop... I'm being ambiguous... 

My last poetic licence...

My reading of Pearl S. Buck was repeatedly interrupted by strange heart flutterings...  So, I put the book down and decided to go to sleep, since it was too late (risk of cortesol dumping which stresses the heart).  But, while sleeping or falling asleep I was awakened by the strange sputtering, as if the heart either stopped beating for a moment or jumped... And I breathed in air, as if that would prevent the heart from permanently stopping.

So, now, I don't want to sleep...  But, it seems that sleep must come...

This may be premature, as I hope it is.  But, I didn't want to leave without ending the blog...

I guess I learned too late that there were many things I wanted to accomplish... with Margarita before going out... But, I guess not everyone has that option...

If you read the blog... you will notice that most of the most important events in my life were beyond my control and preceded me...  Since the most important events occurred in childhood... and defined my life... a theme that we must accept...

What can you expect from a person's life when it begins with a broken heart... I know that sounds a bit cliche... But it was true.  

Until I left for Mexico, I had lived as if my life had ended a long time ago... with the broken heart... Truthfully, I never truly believed that I could recover what I had lost, nor did I believe that I could compensate... And then I met Margarita and developed the life I reconstructed with her over 12 years... and for the first time in my life, I believed there could be a happy ending for me... 

And in the end...

...the world lives with the mess "men" make and leave behind when they leave... and the cycle continues as the world continues spinning... and it seems that there truly wasn't anything we could have done to prevent what was always coming...

it's funny... in my words... that we shut our eyes or they cease seeing and our minds cease thinking (if we allowed them to think)... and even if we should have concerned ourselves with regrets and trying to repair damage we caused in the past, we suddenly cease being... meaning that we cease feeling (if we allowed ourselves to feel what we may have caused others to feel or what we were helpless or without the mind or the heart or the capacity to change for the others)--how I felt when Margarita's grandfather Oligario died...  that the world keeps spinning and it really doesn't matter what he did... the aftermath of his behaviors continue, although he left it all behind...  

In the end, it seems that none of it really mattered...

It matters to me in the moment... But when I cease being, will it really matter what mattered to me at any given moment?

The importance ceased existing...  

"Disposable People; statistics without organic individuality" response to my mother's letter and the concepts of "Destiny" and "Control"

Ross I understand that you are feeling very frightened. After all this incredible event occurred and you haven't a clue as to why. Nor do you know what you should do to prevent another heart attack. You must feel that you haven't any control regarding your destiny. Well I think if truth be told I really don't think any of us have control and we just fool ourselves into thinking we do. Just look at what happened to uncle Henry. He did all the right things and than he got hit by a truck!

Well I hope you succeed in uncovering some information that will provide you with some peace. But I also hope that you can balance your quest for information with some pleasurable activities that provides you with some relief from your fears. I realize that your definition of your self has changed. Before your heart attack you were a man who was pursuing a healthier lifestyle through exercise and diet. Now I guess you see yourself as a post cardiac patient. Well both things are true and over time I hope you will be able to balance out both identities.

Love,, mom

As for Frightened... I don't use that word...  

When I turned 40... or around that time... I had two goals that I kept pretty much in perspective... One was to be showing my paintings by the time I turned 50... Now, I've basically lost the reasoning behind that endeavor with my passion towards understanding the human body and finally truly conquering my health issues during the past 1.5 years.

The second goal was to become a middle-aged man in perfect health.  My mental model was Uncle Henry... And I had my goal set for the age of 50.  Truthfully, I saw that age as being magical for me and not connected with the question of being "over the hill."  Before the heart attack, I saw myself way ahead of schedule... while not yet there 4.5 years before reaching 50, much less than 4.5 years from achieving that goal...  So, with the heart attack, it's not a question of becoming that "super man" I strived towards, although within reason, but a question of understanding truly what is going on... It's a shock.  An incredible disappointment... although in this life I've learned repeatedly that when I expect something... as if I see it as being "in the bag", the game suddenly becomes greatly changed... I should be very weary of what I expect, since, at that moment is when things are about to change greatly.  This is the theme of my life from the age of 4... Think about it: what toddler in a stable household expects to suddenly lose one of their parents... that stable household being thrown into an unimaginable dystopia, chaos?  I've gotta be very careful about what I expect from Margarita, since we've had a very increasingly healthy and productive, constructive relationship for 12 years now... but, for the moment, maybe it is enough that I'm the heavy variable or probability of change in this situation... That, although our relationship continous very strong and healthy, our future has been thrown "up in the air."  

But back to my relationship with my heart attack:

Following the "doctor's orders" for preventing another cardiac "event" and not considering any other form of responding to the situation is overly passive, and makes me think of a premature elderly man or a hospital patient struggling down the hall with a hospital gown and a rolling I.V. poll he's pushing alongside himself...  One second running 4-7 miles per day, the next second...  But, the problem is that there is something wrong with the equation... and it seems that I'm the only one actually interested in understanding the discrepancy... and no, this isn't prime-time television or Hollywood...  Truthfully, no one really gives a damn if there is something "tragically" interesting here... or "unjustly" amiss.  I have those words in parenthesis because I don't actually believe that there is anything tragic or unjust here...  But that most typical Americans would consider this tragic or unjust.  Regardless of this argument, the issue is with how I respond to the situation... Part of the situation are your comments or the comments of others or the lack of response by the cardiologist or the nutritionist... not that they haven't responded to my emails. But, they don't assist in the questions regarding the bio-chemical/physiological issue/concern at hand, my theories or the information I've come across, the new factors within the equation as shown by the blood tests. So, generally, I feel that I'm just talking to myself about what I've come upon or I'm the only one giving myself a pat on the back for having come across a possibly important piece of the puzzle... I see my history as a very interesting and very complex case study.  But, I'm the only sociologist or social worker actually interested in the history... And in the end, my story won't help anyone but myself... to understand.  But, truthfully, has anyone ever truly adequately answered the question, "for what are we here on this planet, in this life? What are we here for to do?"  And, no, I don't believe it is to pro-create/reproduce the human species... since we work equally hard at destroying ourselves and our human  community...  But, equally, as you know, I've never bought into your perspective that "we only live one life."  Yes, we don't have concrete proof of past lives or future lives or afterlives...  But something has very strongly hinted to me that we are so much more than this current life... As if there was something we are here to do... with other people... and the loss of people and how we lost them or how they shaped us when we were together is very important towards understanding... especially if you see the connection between them and you and your offspring or how your presenting them to others influenced the "others'" lives... especially if those people influenced were not blood relatives, like my father's relationship with Uncle Henry...  

Truthfully, how important was Uncle Henry as a person... as a doctor?  I would imagine we could say that he greatly influenced many people.  But, if we weigh his accomplishments against that of my father's, we could naively believe that my father accomplished nothing more than make you a young widow and make 3 young children "orphans"... giving two of them his illness and making the three of them live miserably for long periods of time or for many intervals over a long period of time...  

And, yes, that would be a belief based upon ignorance and naivity.  But it wouldn't be the ignorant naive person's fault if they didn't hear Uncle Henry explain how it was my father who inspired him to become a doctor, study sciences and go to medical school one day...  What my father did for your impressionable little brother (ten years his junior) was give him an incredibly important role model, a hero, which turns out to be such a modern-day miracle...  Both men were "tragically" cut down.  But, not before both had shared their powers with an other or others...  

Bad knews about your theory about Uncle Henry... based upon what I read over a month ago on "ghost bikes" or "transportation alternatives"... He wasn't wearing a helmut, which would have saved his life...  But, for some reason or another, he had to leave the story.  

And, some how, some where, this is where I pick up the story, because it was exactly 6 months after Uncle Henry's death that I started looking at my health and my illnesses alternatively, when I decided to take a proactive interest in my health and started researching alternatives and learning about nutrition and the importance of fruits, vegetables, cow's liver, herbs, seeds, spices, nuts, legumes etc for health and healing... but, at first, mainly for nutrition and for creating a certain internal balance...  

I know it leans towards wishful thinking, but I can't help thinking that Uncle Henry and my father are spiritually connected with me in my pursuit of true health or some basic truths about the human body... that we may have become out of touch with due to modern consumerism that includes how we shop, eat, and confront ailments and illnesses... 

It's easier to buy an energy drink or take some prescription medicine than it is to understand why we lack energy (beyond what we consider normal) or why we have become ill...  Life has become a convenience store, a take-out restaurant, a microwave dinner, a disposable cup (you don't have to spend/waste 30 seconds washing it)...  We believe we have no time.. and then, suddenly we see that we've run out of time... and that, maybe we didn't spend the time for possibly creating more time...  we didn't invest quality energy for creating quality time.. and now we suddenly realize that we are the disposable person...

And that's how I see the doctors' relationship with our ailments... and, moreso, the pharmaceutical companies' disregard towards how their drugs truly affect our health and our future, since what they are regarding much more than health concerns is the stock report's bottom line... and how they fair against the competitor and if the public still believes in them or their product...  Instead of being a patient with a problem that the doctor must solve which translates in the concept of "cure", we are just statistics without organic individuality, meaning that our illnesses or ailments may have a different cause and a different remedy than the others... 

Did you notice last year that Noah Gordons Epic book "the Doctor" of the Doctor Cole trilogy became a movie?  The story is about a suddenly orphaned English boy is taken under a "Barber's" custody and is shown how to sell elixers and entertain people in fairs 1,000 years ago...  However, the boy was born with a gift of sensing the health of the patient brought to the Barber (Barbers were actually healers--barbaric healers--and doctors were actually blood letters back then... "the dark ages" controlled by the Church, that intentionally ignored the science of the Greeks and the Arabs.  In mid-evil Europe, it was more likely that you would be killed by the more prestigous Doctor than by a barber.  But, the barber wasn't practicing medicine either...) when he grabbed their hand... Actually, he was sent a jolt of what was about to happen to the person if they were about to die of some sort of illness...  During the barbers rounds around the British Isles, he was presented to a Jewish doctor, much different from the Christian doctors, who had lots of medical transcripts and a basic understanding of curing certain popular ailments.  The boy asked the Jewish doctor how he came across the transcripts and how he learned to cure, since the boy needed to work with his "gift" that scared the hell out of him... And the Jewish doctor explained that he would have to travel to Isfahan (the former Persian capital of present time Iran) and study under the great Persian Doctor/Professor Ibn Sina, otherwise known in world scientific and medical history as Avicena... but that it would be impossible for him, since the great medical schools of the middle east only accepted Muslims and Jews...  In the end, the boy turned young man disguises himself as a Jew and makes the 3 year journey from England to Persia; in the end studying under Ibn Sina (Avicena).  Aside from this being an incredible story and a look into modern plagues and how doctors (and governments) of the middle ages responded to plagues... and how appendicitis was possibly the most prevalent killer of non-plague time, mainly because the church prohibited exploratory surgeries (you could amputate, but you couldn't open the person's body to heal or understand them, although you can mutilate hundreds of thousands of people in constant religious or political wars or in your prisons or Cathedral basements) and prohibited autopsies/dissection of human cadavers...; at the time, common belief was that the internal human body was the same as that of a pig's.  So, to understand human appendicitis, human disease, the doctors dissected pigs... which was a fruitless endeavor for curing people.

The greatest lesson Ibn Sina (Avicena) taught the young man was, "in order to cure a person, you must first learn to truly listen to them with all of your senses..."

I am certain that is what Uncle Henry believed.  

So, if the doctors don't want to truly listen to me... then I've gotta pay a lot of attention to myself... while I still have the senses to do so...  And if all of this is just talking to myself... well.. at the very least, I've become a very good listener and I've learned over the years to highly respect myself.  You have no idea...

Think about it...  The winter that Anya was in Kiev, Ukraine, I was placed on anti-depresants again... and again, I had a "psychotic episode" where I tried killing myself... I downed a ton of the anti-depresants with a lot of Rum and I didn't awaken for about 2 days...  This was living in my last apartment on Ocean Avenue between Kings Highway and Avenue O...  A wonderful apartment or lair...  I claimed that it was an existential game I was playing with God...  "Truthfully, if you created me to die 'before my time', then let's play a bit of Russian Roulette... and see truly what are the stakes..."  But, call it what I did... as the "intellectual" I was, there was only one bottom line: I was tired of being left, every since dad died... you emotionally left...  But, there may have been a problem with never breast feeding..., which also is an icy and immediate intentional distancing of the mother towards the baby...  But, not only could I not handle being left, although I also did the periodically leaving... (Leaving for Mexico was my grand achievement towards the illusion of leveling the playing field...  There's a point in the toddler's life when they try "punishing" the parent [or the sibling or the cat or the dog] in a way they feel they were "punished".. and they start repeating the same responses to their parent [or the others] in very seemingly "adult" ways...  You would call it "role playing"...  But, I believe that it is a way of trying to seize control of their emotional world...  If they could be like their parent, they could stop feeling so needy or helpless...  Often you can see how a husband treats the wife by how the toddler talks to his mother... at least here in Mexico...  I am certain that he learned that way of relating to her by his father!  Where else would he have learned that inconsiderate, hurtful or disrespectful adult behavior?)... there was another bottom line: I hadn't yet developed a stable self-image of myself that would continuously place me in positions of vulnerability...  But, the development of that stable self-image truly must be formed in a healthy and stable home/school/neighborhood environment during the person's formative years of childhood and adolescence... Not to have begun the developmental process in College and later on... especially not in New York City...  But, as you always said, "City kids are SO MUCH more sophistocated than suburban kids..."  So, I imagine I had much more to learn in NYC than I would have learned in suburbia...  It was either "make it or break it..." And I left for Mexico...

And I truly learned who I am and learned to greatly appreciate and respect myself...  I overcame so many obstacles you can't imagine.  And I developed a true and healthy identity and helped develop the identities of others here... Maybe I won't "give Margarita a house..."  But, I truly believe that I gave her an incredible experience and a wonderful oportunity.  The problem is that I think a premature ending to my life would cause a horrible and incredibly heavy sadness in hers... Believe it or not, I believe that there is an injustice of sharing so much with her or introducing her to what no one else would have introduced her to... If I exit prematurely.  And that is the great emptiness I would leave her... 

And that's a problem for me.  

You don't believe me... Or you believe I'm exaggerating... Or you think this is very egoistic... or that I'm full of myself.  However, let me tell you about egoism:

The most wonderful part of my life with Margarita was when I stopped painting and could dedicate much more time and energy to her needs and our relationship, when we could truly apreciate the "fruits of our labor", for what we truly had struggled so many hours for so many years...  When I stopped thinking about the time I needed for finishing a painting or, upon returning from the fairs, when would I start painting again... Or if she wanted to do something with me (like physically bonding at night when I was painting until possibly wee hours of the morning) or taking a walk or going to the movies or any form of truly quality time together... I found myself battling between her needs and my needs, "weighing the consequences"...  And then the wonderful experience of being able to plan a vacation she wanted in December and visiting Enrique and Ivette in Mexico City and visiting Tepotzlan, Morelos with them (Do you see Margarita's wonderful happiness to the left way above Tepotzlan?) and then visiting her parents in Veracruz and then travelling with her to Tabasco and visiting Villahermosa (and its parks and museums; that I NEVER wanted to do in Xalapa) and the cacao plantations and then returning to her parents' ranch for New Years... and not once having anything I could imagine better to do... and truly enjoying time with her...  And that was my life with Margarita the year before my heart attack, losing weight and truly spending quality time together... that made my painting so obsolete...  

Yes, I know what a "premature" death would do to Margarita... Because I've always known just how important our relationship was for us... and what inspired me the day I met her in Las Cañadas and why I strove those first 5 months to prove to her why we must make a life together... I lost connection with that during the incredibly stress and difficulties of my life in Mexico between 2003 and 2010... A lot of resentment built up... But, we learned to overcome that.  Margarita's birthday week in Sayulita was "the icing on the cake" of our relationship... at least for me.... which is what makes the heart attack "12" hours after returning from the coast that much more frustrating...  

Would you believe that I believe her experience with me in the hospital (her first true "hospital experience") was very important/meaningful for her and the both of us...  She had heard so much of our family's hospital experiences and my hospital experiences.  But, she had never truly been there... had your experience or that of Tracy or Esta or...  I know it sounds a bit "morbid" or twisted.  But, we can both say that she was by my side while I was "on the table" and the whole night long...  and was as strong and "level headed" as can be hoped for...  and adapted very well alongside the nurses...  

So now we have that under our belt...  

what next?