Pico de Orizaba

Pico de Orizaba
Taken from Huatusco, Veracruz, the closest town to Margarita's family's ranch.

Thursday, March 12, 2015

The Day I Died...

... I woke up in Margarita and my bed in Guadalajara instead of in Sayulita... 7am... walked downstairs and prepared coffee in the Cuisinart, and re"fried" black beans on the stove... Drank a cup of coffee, eat a small bowl of "fried" black beans with raw tomato, raw onions and crumbled feta cheese... before I finished my cup of black coffee, I popped a chocolate truffle in my mouth from the birthday present Socorro gave Margarita last night... I had read the label on the box of truffles as I always do and accepted that it had partially (or not so partially--"they" don't specify) hydrogenated soybean oil (actually "they" specify "vegetable fat" as the first ingredient)...  Vegetable fat is what gives the chocolate (or chocolate bars) their texture and usually, their ability to remain hard (and why they have partially or not so partially hydrogenated vegetable oil, otherwise known as transfats)...  And, of course, soybean oil is the least expensive of the vegetable fats on the market...  What's the issue?  It seems that I have an allergy to soy...  But, when your diet is full of all sorts of crap, you don't so easily detect what is the cause of your malady.  Considering that I've removed basically all of the crap (the fun stuff) from my diet and a chocolate bar may be the only "pastry/desert" I experience in a week, it became very easy to detect reactions...  to wonderful supposedly high quality dark chocolate bars...  Sudden headaches, joint and muscle aches...  

I served myself another cup of coffee and went upstairs to check my correspondence and look at the photos Margarita and I took in Sayulita the past week... But, I immediately stopped drinking the coffee, thinking that maybe one cup was more than enough... because I started feeling bad.  It was like the occasional reactions to Alcohol or Apple Cider (sulphites) I knew since drinking that wonderful apple cider in the parking lot of the Oldwick General Store with Francesca in 1986... Pain in the chest, headache, muscle aches in my back or in my abdomin.  However, this time I wasn't experiencing rapid heart beat and migrain-like headache... my muscle cramps were softer... and this time my greatest pain was in the esophagus rising to the lower back jaw and the molers...  I mentioned to Margarita that I was having an alcohol-like reaction and that it would pass in 30 minutes...  But it didn't pass.  So I layed down in my bed hoping the relaxation would lead to its passing...  And it didn't pass, although I did fall asleep momentarily...  

When I awakened I decided that it did not make a difference if I was sitting at the computer or laying in bed... the pain in the throat would continue... so I want back downstairs and took my BP... it was a bit high...  in the 144/100 range... which I attributed to the sudden change in altitude after being on the coast for a week.  I returned upstairs and proceeded to do a set of 72 quick push-ups and then a set of 20 wheel crunches (if that's what they are called; we call it "the llantita"...)  I imagined that if I was having a prolonged sulphure-like allergic reaction (or a heart attack), I wouldn't be able to do my usual over 60 reps of quick push-ups, and less 20 reps of the llantita... or I would be very fatigued... But, I was able to do them... and took my bp again; it dropped about 10-15 points... but the pains continued.  Margarita said that she was ready to leave for our 5km run when I was ready...  and I hesitated a while... in the end, I made it out to the Metropolitan Park and a cool but very sunny day and took off my shirt... not enough sun on the beach?  Possibly never enough Vitamin D... for lowering BP amongst other things...  I doubted I would be able to withstand the 5km run... because of the continuing pain in my throat and chest, that radiated towards my back, was felt in my lower abdomin and lower back too... and caused a strange coughing like the clearing of my throat.  But, in the end, my legs (like my arms) proved unaffected by the possible reaction to the soybean oil in the truffles and I managed a slow but firm run...  At first, it seemed that the run or the pumping of blood through my body during the first brisk mile removed the pain from my throat and chest.  But, later on it returned as it had been...  Something I imagined I must live with for a while more...  

Margarita and I passed by the local super-mall for looking for some inexpensive videos at Mix-Up music store... and I suddenly felt nauseous... but I let it pass... we were looking for "Ghost", "Dirty Dancing" (part of a ride home conversation yesterday... why? I don't remember) and some Oscar Award winning movies staring Penelope Cruz or written by Almodavar... or not award winning but starring Tom Cruise and Penelope Cruz or the wonderful mouthed Scarlett Johanssen... We didn't find the Tom Cruise, but we did find the Patrick Swayze and Woopie Goldberg and Almodavar and Penelope Cruz and Woody Allen with Scarlett Johanssen...  And "Small Town; Big Gun" that we wanted to see for Margarita's birthday a year ago... but for some reason they always removed from the theater the day we went to see it...  

And then I started feeling woosy again... And then I had to stop the car on the side of Costco and lie down in back...  And because Margarita was anxious to go home to eat (I was also hungry, but now very nauseous and not feeling very capable of driving), I shortened that stint and drove the 20 minutes home in fast traffic the best I could... the last few blocks greatly worried that I would accident... and it seemed that I also was experiencing a sudden bout of diarrhea... and parked as quickly as I could, ran to the bathroom and gave Margarita the keys to the kitchen door... But, really didn't have the energy for going to the bathroom, although it felt like diarrhea...  And the pain in the chest and what felt like irregular heartbeats... and I lay down on the couch for a minute and didn't eat the scrambled eggs Margarita prepared me, although she has the magic touch for scrambled... and I took my BP...  90/56, heart rate around 50... explaining the dizziness/nausea... But only something I knew after mild anesthesia or the wrong ADD medication in '86...  Margarita suggested preparing me coffee with milk and sugar, thinking that I was experiencing a shortage of sugar after the run, although I told her I had eaten that Truffle and a left-over corn tortilla in the morning...  And when I was running 7 miles per day, I didn't experience this...

And went upstairs to sleep...  

Margarita followed me upstairs with the cup of coffee and lay in bed with me, hugging me from behind... I imagine we slept a few minutes... And I went downstairs to eat my cold eggs and cold re"fried" black beans and drink my cup of cold regular coffee... And everything was fine cold... although I felt cold... Mexico was hit by an incredible cold spell that we felt in Sayulita (that made the vacation that much more enjoyable, since there was no hot humidity, although the air was brisk in the strong sunlight... but we didn't experience uncomfortable sweating there and slept wonderfully).  But here it is cold and sunny...  And I'm sitting at the computer with shorts, sandles and a T-shirt...  While eating, my BP had risen a few points, but was still very low for me... Now after writing for a while (writing on the computer greatly raises my BP and why I don't spend so much time writing these years, since it could actually be dangerous for me) and the cup of coffee having taken affect, my BP is at 119/76 with a pulse around 72...  I'm tired, which is normal after exercise... the pain in my chest and my throat (always more pronounced in my throat) has dulled some...  

And maybe it is a form of heart failure... maybe it is just a form of allergic reaction... from the soybean oil... 

I won't be visiting a doctor, nor a hospital...  You should understand why not... 

And if it is an impending heart attack... I was thinking about this with half-closed eyes sitting in the bathroom hours earlier... "what I was doing the day I died..." because, if this is it, no one will know what happened or what was happening... if I don't write this beforehand...  

Heart failure is the result of accumulated damage over many many years of poor eating habits and poor exercise habits... My blood tests could come back perfect today and still could be approaching a heart attack or a stroke from plaques accumulated over the years (arterial plaques are the body's attempt towards repairing damage to the arterial walls... they are similar to the welding of a scrap of iron to a pipe that has a fracture or hole... The arteries aren't returned to new, and the plaque invades some of the space of the blood stream--current...)  There are a lot of things we can do to try and reverse the destruction against our bodies... we can become very healthy in the end... and still suddenly die of a heart attack or a stroke or cancer...  And why the late stage surgeries (which most are) and the medications and the chemotherapy and the radiation therapy DON'T CHANGE ANYTHING FOR THE BETTER...  ask Patrick Swayze and Laura Ziskin and how many others who were NOT saved by the chemotherapy...  Patrick blamed his Pancreatic Cancer on his chain smoking, which he continued until his death.  But, the moving of the cancer from the Pancrease to the Liver to the Stomach to the small intestine was blamed upon the Chemo...  And he only live 20 months after the diagnosis and the surgeries and the radiation and the chemo... and Barbara Walters asked him if he was doing any homeopathy... and he said, "some chinese herbs" which means, "no"...  But, the doctors gained a ton of money and Patrick's family can say to itself (especially his wife now remarried) that they "did all [they] could"...  If you don't spend the money and make him suffer a bit more, you will suffer with horrible doubt and possible recriminations...  But, "if you did all that you could within your means" (making the doctors and pharmaceuticals richer) and he or she dies, at their death you can live at peace with yourself... But if you didn't do all of that, you would suffer for years after he or she died... 

Do you get my jist?

And maybe I'll live to 95 years and not just 45.5... But, I've never felt this before... So, I'm living in doubt... But, I will be damned if I give that false power over my body and economy to doctors and pharmaceuticals who aren't there to help you... nor do they believe they can actually truly help you...  They are not in the healing "business" for many decades now...  The sell you "peace of mind"...  But, only if you didn't know better...  

We all die at any given time...  Most deaths aren't announced... Nor are they like in Hollywood films... giving the spouse time to say goodbye... 

And that's something that worries me...  That she suddenly had the lights turned out on her... and no, the lights weren't turned out on her... it would be much easier...  if the ending was truly the ending... and we could actually move on unscathed...  

And I don't know why I mentioned "Ghost" and felt I must purchase the video if I couldn't find it on Youtube... Instead we found on YouTube the wonderful Spanish/Italian/Bosnian film starring Penelope Cruz and Emile Hirsch "Twice Born" and another very interesting Spanish film starring Penelope Cruz "Open Your Eyes"... Suddenly losing someone very important to you... Who knows? Maybe for the survivors, cancer is the best solution, because they're there dying with you for a while... nothing sudden and shocking...  like an accident or a bombing or an assault or a heart attack... 

Who knows? 

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