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As most people who have wallked along with me over the years know, I have had heart issues. In the last two months I seem to have moved onto another stage. Up until recently, I had really only felt angina (heart pain due to constriction of the vessels - or spasms/cramps - supplying oxygenated blood to the heart muscle) right before my two last heart attacks. Yes, occasionally it would hit when I was under anxiety of one form or another. But my “normal” state was a mostly painless existence. Apparently, that has changed.
I kind of freaked out one of the first recent nights when the pain hit hard. I really thought it was going to be strike three. But with deep breaths and relaxation techniques I was able to chase it away. Subsequently, it has happened about twice per day for the last few weeks. I knew that it was common for advanced heart disease patients to have regular pain when doing certain things. My new pain matched all these criteria. It has now gotten to the point where I do still get concerned when the signs begin, but I am no longer afraid of having to check myself into the medical system immediately. After learning that it can be chased away, I don't panic anymore. It is the new normal.
I have found other ways to manage the pain to some extent. Nitroglycerin tablets are incredibly helpful when I can't relax my way out of the growing ache. Another simple solution is to just slow down. When walking up my huge hill each day, I simply go at about half speed. I know I look weird and I feel awkward, but it keeps the pain at bay. When I am in between houses and no one can see me, I will often just stand for a minute and breathe deeply. This helps a lot. Carrying heavy loads, or chopping wood seems to trigger the pain. Anything that puts my upper torso under stress can result in discomfort. All the while, my biggest issue as always has to do with anxiety. So, much of this is psychosomatic (as was the reason for the heart issues in first place).
I will say something I'd never known until now - and I am aware of how bizarre this sounds - when the pain subsides, it is like getting a narcotic buzz. I'm supposing that endorphins are released in great amounts, so that when the pain is gone I actually get a buzz! (Rarely discussed aspects, ha!)
I never feel secure with my finances. I need so little, but I ride the razor's edge in order to maintain a simple life. If I didn't get jabbed by my heart, life would be pretty damn easy to maintain. However, this kind of existence (one that requires daily physical work) is something I've waited my whole life for. That this life would have to end with me rotting in a hospital, unable to be outdoors, is simply...not gonna happen.
I need to find a way to still live on my land, right up to the moment. And if that means never seeking any medical help, or seeking limited help, or whatever, I will not give up the quality of life for quantity. I simply don't care about stretching my life out, with the tubes and machines I'd be hitched up to. I do not trust the medical system to do what is best for me. It takes care of itself first. Although I am willing to USE it for what I know is best for me, I must be vigilant not to be sucked in by it.
As I have chosen the unconventional life, so shall I choose the unconventional death. If things come down for me. I plan to use my decline and death to highlight a point--to leave a powerful message. I will “not go quiet into that good night.”
There is reason to be hopeful that in Maine, as a well-off state in the wealthiest nation that has ever graced the face of the planet, some modest health care compassion might be coming. Gasp! Our governor elect will finally allow Medicaid expansion to occur in this state. So after the first of the year, I may actually be able to afford some basic health care. Being saddled with unpayable debt is worse to me than dying, because I already walk the financial tightrope and cannot handle even one more expense. Having debt on my shoulders to treat something that isn't my fault, is sure to make my physical situation as stressful and deadly as it possibly could be anyway. I would be beholden to someone else for the rest of my life. That is absolutely unacceptable.
So, the plan is to hold out and manage the pain until I can afford the financial help I need to treat myself. I fully know how most people handle these kinds of health issues. The habit is to simply go to the doctor and do everything that he/she tells you without question; get tangled up in appointments and their drug experiments. And every bit of it costs more and more money as the trap tightens. No more for me. The two stents in my heart were each medical mistakes. They were unnecessary and have likely shortened my life by thirty years. There is no legal recourse. There is no going back. The medical system GAVE me heart disease. Now I am an experiment for their databases. "Does he live? Does he die?" Either way it's good for them, because they can gather data about how their error affected just another civilian lab rat. I won't put myself on their butcher block again...
As for the concerned people who can't help assuming they know what is better for me than my own plan? I need them to NOT do that. I am not a problem to be solved. Instead, I am an event to be observed and reported upon. I am not just a living magazine. I am a life story. And, this story will eventually be seen as such. I have no desire that it be instructional. I'd rather just have it be entertaining, and possibly inspiring. There are tragedies in the real world, just like in the literary world. There are triumphs too. I love a happy ending. But honestly, I never forget a sad one. I don't want to be forgotten. The king I was named after believed way back in the Fourth Century BC, that eternal life had nothing to do with survival after death. He was motivated by fame in the material world. Now his name will live on throughout the remote ages of the future here on earth. Just being remembered for a few years after I'm gone - with an undeniable lesson attached for the greedy, selfish, ignorant, ideologically poisoned society that killed me about WHY I couldn't live to be old enough to even receive Social Security - would be good enough for me.
Other Sources About My Heart History
Blog accounts account of the premature end to my Journeys, because of the second heart attacks...
Narrated video - http://ubron.org/groupdocs/Day%2039%20Audio.mp3
Interview with me about having medical issues without insurance...
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This post was added to the blog as a supplemental essay. It will serve as a place to cite whenever this issue sticks its ugly face into my project. Should be back to the normal struggle of simply trying to survive out in the Maine woods on donations alone.
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