Here it is…12:30 in the morning and I am up, nervous about tomorrow and remembered my blog so thought I write. I passed the 2 year Cancer Survivor on August 4, 2008. Very exciting but will be happier with each passing year.

Yes, at the moment, I am a little discouraged as it seems that my health continues to give me issues. I don’t know if it is all caused by the cancer but it all started at that time. In 2005 my mother died, in 2006 I was diagnosed with cancer, in 2007 the benign tumor was found in my left ear and now in 2008…….drumroll….a pacemaker. You are reading correctly…a pacemaker. A 48 year old woman with a pacemaker. I am much too young for that! Over the last few months I have had “episodes” of lightheadedness, fatique, dizziness. I didn’t think too much about them as I always had a reason, got up to fast, walking too fast, the humidity, etc. It wasn’t until I had an MRI in August to check on the benign tumor (which is fine) that I found out that my heart rate was only 48 (normal is 60 to 100 beats a minutes). Over the last several weeks, I have had a EKG, wore a holter monitor, blood tests, and an stress echocardiogram and still can’t believe I need a pacemaker. It seems I have something called a Heart Block…2nd degree Mobitz Type II. The heart is fine but the electrical circuit from the top chambers to the lower chambers has developed a “short”. The stress echocardiogram showed that it would not get better on it own and would only get worse. I had to walk on a treadmill for as long as I could…after 9 1/2 minutes my heart rate was only 63.

Unfortunately, tomorrow I am having outpatient surgery to remove my mediport and then on the 22nd the pacemaker surgery. I hate that my mediport has to be taken out but they said it had to. They tell me after my pacemaker surgery I will feel like a new woman.

Maybe then life will return to normal.

Love, Lori