I’ve got rhythm, but lately I’ve been dancing to a new beat, hence, heart tests.
An echocardiogram is a test where a technologist plays deep sea sounds while she hugs you from behind and tells you to stop breathing. “Okay, take a tiny breath in. Hold it.” Beep. Being a rule follower I await further instruction. It is some time before she says, “Breathe as needed.”
“Okay, stop breathing.” Again, she goes quiet. I begin to worry.
Without breathing, I ask, “Can I breathe?”
“Don’t talk” she hisses. I wince as she presses her cattle prod between my ribs. At my next opportunity to breathe as needed, I ask why it hurts so much. I silently wonder if she recently did one of those Ancestry DNA tests. I suspect she was delighted to discover that she is a descendant of Vlad The Impaler. “You have a bony chest” she shares. Well, that’s something I’ll be sure to include in my next personal ad.
“Blow out. Hold it.”
After resuscitating me, she strips the bed of its medical exam table paper, scrunches it into an enormous ball and hands it to me. “Use this to wipe the gel off your chest.” Perhaps this is the personality portion of the test. Assertive types respond, “Don’t be ridiculous, give me a warm wet washcloth” and they both share a laugh. I use the giant wad, and smear gel on my pants. I’m the only one not laughing.
Today’s echocardiogram is different. It’s part of a stress test which had in fact begun prior to my appointment when my credit card got stuck in the parking machine. It’s still there. The stress test begins with an echo, then time on the treadmill and a fast transition to a second echo.
My target heart rate they tell me is 131. “We must reach 131.” The two cardiology technologists seem confident.
In 65 years I’ve never been on a treadmill. Turns out I can’t do it. A technologist stands on either side of me. I begin stomping like the Hulk with my bottom stuck out.
“Just walk normally.”
“No, don’t bend forward.”
“Your legs are too far back.”
“Smaller steps.”
“Larger steps.”
“Just walk like you usually do.”
“Move further forward.” I feel one of them push me from behind. I start breathing heavily at 85, switch to tiptoe and try to remember how to walk. Certain that I’ve now met my target, I await her congratulations. “Good, 95.” I feel some stress.
They are to inject me with dye once I reach my goal and we are all to wait 30 seconds before I am allowed to leap from the treadmill onto the bed beside it. I am then to assume the echo position which is to lie on my left side, left arm above my head, right arm draped over my right hip. I review this as I attempt heel walking.
“Are you wanting to stop?” I hear her say over my wheezing.
“I don’t know” I squeak out. All I do know is I don’t want to stop and have to start again. They repeat the question, and I whimper in response, “But, I’m not at 131.”
The technologist on my right says, “Oh, you passed that a while ago.” I immediately stop walking.
“Don’t stop walking!” they shout. I return to Hulk mode, though more of a Hulk shuffle soon to be a Hulk lie-down. At my earliest opportunity I leap onto the bed and assume the position perfectly. I wait for praise and heave air into my lungs.
“Breathe. Hold it.”
At the end of all this testing, I hope that my symptoms are ascribed to deconditioning. My doctor can then assign me an exercise regimen, exempting treadmills.
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