A couple weeks back, I found out that my brother Moe had been diagnosed with HCM – I wrote about it HERE. This week is test week for me… meaning Monday, Tuesday, & Wednesday I get to undergo a barrage of tests, pokes, & prods to see if this potentially hereditary thickening of the myocardium of the heart is something that I have as well.

Yesterday, I had the EKG, which is a way (invented by the Germans!) to monitor the electrical activity of the heart. Eileen attached 11 sticky pads to my chest, & then hooked me up, one electronic tentacle at a time, to the EKG machine. She turned it on & left it running for a good 10 seconds, then switched it off, & reversed the tentacle attachment process. Then, in a swift motion, (& with nary a warning, I might add) proceeded to remove the sticky pads from my chest. As I’m not a manscaper, this hurt. 11 times.

Then it was on to the blood pressure check, ala the arm cuff. Only this time, it was taken on both arms, also by the aforementioned Eileen.

The doctor came in about this time, & placed the icy cold (is there any other kind?) stethoscope on my chest, back, neck, etc. & asked me to breathe. And flex. Cool. Day 1 of the testing was then over, with another round of tests to be set up for ASAP. And no real interpretation of the results of the day, other than, “Doesn’t look bad.”

Today was echo-cardiogram day, which is an ultrasound of the structure of the heart. For those of you who have had an ultrasound (like when you’re pregnant) you know exactly what comes next… the goop. Keith applied the goop, liberally I might add, to my chest, & spent the next half hour doing his best to make sure that there wasn’t anywhere on my chest, neck & stomach that didn’t get covered with the stuff. Nice. Thanks. But the good news is, when it was done, he gave me a paper towel, 1, one, paper towel to clean myself up. Let’s just say that I needed to go get a few more. Like 12.

And, no interpretation of the results yet. That comes later; next Tuesday actually.

Tomorrow I go in to LabCorp, after 12 hours of no food, (which obviously makes us Oh so Hungry…) to get blood drawn – to test my cholesterol, among other things. After that, I eat (of course) then I’m off, solo :(, to Danville for the Fall Pastors’ Conference, which goes until Friday.

Good times.