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Diciembre 22, 2007
Can you say that in Spanish
We were driving to church tonight. In our car were my Girls and my sister's girls, who were born in Argentina. We were talking about spanish and saying words and phrases in both English and Spanish.
Lili piped up. "But you know, you can't laugh in Spanish!"
What?
Posted by rob at 10:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Diciembre 20, 2007
Memoir - Chapter 4: My Dad
I’ve mentioned my dad a few times already. December 20 is a particularly appropriate date to think about him. My dad died 18 years ago on December 20. His heart stopped while he was standing in friend’s kitchen in Mexico city. He was attended by an EMT within 30 seconds but was dead within 2 or 3 minutes. We never got an autopsy, so don’t know exactly what his condition was. But we know he had some electrical issues with his heart, and had experienced some blackout spells earlier that week. While we aren’t sure, we think his was a similar arrhythmia to mine – but he didn’t survive.
Now dad was always intending to get more physical exercise. He knew he needed to be more fit, but he wasn’t. And his life didn’t give him the room. Even the week before he died, he told mom about the blackouts and said “If I wasn’t leaving the country tomorrow, I’d go have these checked out” When I was a small child he even had a bike. I remember riding in the child seat to nursery school. But it was stolen, and by the time he replaced it - 10 years later – there was no room in his life for the exercise a bike could represent.
God used cycling to create in my heart a strength that was not present in the heart of my father. I have to admit that God use that strength to save my life. I am grateful.
But my consistent reaction is to think that God used strengths in my father to do work I can never imagine being done through me. So my thoughts when I compare our stories usually are “Why am I here and he is not?” How can it be that God’s plan was not to let him do what he was? Dad was so busy, motivated by a clear call, successful in his work, incredibly useful. He was 45. In the usual self-depreciation of comparison I think myself lazy, question my call, don’t see movement or success and don’t feel used. I’m 38. So I ask, "What is Gods plan that has been left for me for my future? This is part of it, but what?"
Neither caricature is true. I know of my father’s struggles and failures. I know the good work I do and where God has blessed me. I know the hard things in both our lives. But I still find myself asking: "God what are you doing? What am I doing here when Dad is not?"
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Diciembre 18, 2007
Memoir - Chapter 3: Strength and Weakness
At a moment in my life when I felt the strongest, God has chosen to expose a significant and life changing weakness. At a moment when riding 100 miles and climbing mountains was more and more possible, when I was climbing into the ranks of those hard guys who can push their bodies hard in that sort of thing. I was climbing over missionary ridge in faster and faster times. I was climbing mountains strongly without having to stop halfway up. I was joining the race club, and was looking forward to a winter of training rides that would push me into better and better condition. (In fact the ride on October 6 was the very first time I wore the race club kit, jersey and shorts full of color and sponsors. I was feeling like a racer!)
But now there is this weakness, this exposure in my body that says everything is not all right. It was really hard to take. Its hard to be told that it is dangerous to get stronger. Its hard to be told that I’ll be limited. Its hard to think that exploits are not possible.
It felt like an insult, like a statement from God: “So there, You can’t do what you want to do. In fact, I don’t want you to do what you enjoy” That’s hard to take. One thing I was passionate about and felt was a good expression for my body and balance in my life was being taken away. 
In fact that one thing had become for me a moment of worship and celebration. I remember several rides where I would start being consumed with all the “better things” I should be doing. Suddenly in the midst of my condemnation, I would be overwhelmed with the glory of God expressed in the East Tennessee landscape. I would celebrate God’s goodness and worship him while I was riding. But now, even this was being taken away.
The original incident was caused by my stupidity. I hydrated very poorly in that ride, I really overextended my self, and I thought that was the reason for my incident. I learned from that, felt like I knew what I should do in the future, how to be smart and not let this happen. Even with the pacemaker, I felt like I’d be ok, I’d be able to enjoy a hard ride. I’d get a heart monitor and not let my pace get into the range where there might be a problem.
But there is more, there is the cardiomyopathy – a weakness, sickness in my heart muscle. It doesn’t let me just keep doing what I wanted to do. That doesn’t let me be strong and smart. Its weakness in my flesh. It might be getting worse or better. That was a hard blow. The first day I drove up to the pharmacy to fill my prescription I was really depressed. It seemed like such a reversal to be joining the ranks of the chemically dependent. I didn’t want to be chained by the pill bottle.
So this became a new arena of my sickness: The emotions, the spiritual. Here I’ve discovered, recovery has been much different. This is the hard work for me. This is where the struggle is ongoing.
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Diciembre 15, 2007
Memoir - Chapter 2: The Hospital
Near death was one afternoon. Ongoing life – so far, a bit longer.
After the doctors got my heart under control I wanted to go home, but they wanted to know what was going on. We talked with the cardiologist about what had been happening and they explained more clearly what had been happening. Essentially my heart had been short circuiting, only the ventricles had been working, not the aorta. So only half the function was really going on. My body recognized the lack of blood pressure and pushed my heart for more – so it raced and raced. Again, a normally conditioned heart would not have survived for 3 – 4 hours at that pace. Ironically the passion for cycling had not only created a life threatening situation, it had saved my life as well.
The doctors now assume that the episode of Altitude sickness in Colorado this summer was really another arrhythmia. We knew that my dads fatal heart attack at 45 was also a similar arrhythmia. (we were not able to have an autopsy done at the time – longer story). Later as I was in the hospital, my heart did it again, entering the same high rate short circuit. However this time it lasted only six seconds and then jumped out on its own. This wasn’t just my stupid dehydration on a long hot cycling day. It was a bigger reality, the investigation became more critical – and they kept me at Memorial until it was figured out.
I was amazed at all the guests. The first few days I was in critical care, which has very restrictive visiting hours. But after my pastor dramatized the happenings in his sermon there were a lot of visitors who made it in, and more who could not. Friends spent the whole first night with Marialice in the waiting room, even though I assumed she had gone home. Remember…. I felt fine! Most of my fellow elders flashed their elder badges and got by security with a confident bluster. But one pastor got sent away in a moment of confusion. The staff asked me if I wanted to see him, but I thought they were asking me if I wanted them to call one of the pastors of New City Fellowship. Strange, I thought, pastors have already been here… No you don’t have to call. So they sent Jim Pickett away… This pastor has led a men’s group that has significantly impacted my life over the last 2 years and I was wanting to start exploring the emotions of this event with him. But we missed that opportunity. That would become a pattern.
Doctors spent the first part of the week waiting for the drugs I had been pumped with on Saturday to work their way out of my body. Any tests needed to be focused on my true heart condition, rather than any drugged state. After waiting all day Sunday for the doctor to come, it was really depressing to be told on Monday that he couldn’t do anything and that we’d have to wait more. On Wednesday Dr Salerno ran a test of the electrical system. He saw the place in my heart where the short circuit had occurred and was able to reproduce it easily in the controlled environment of the test. Sometimes cardiologists can burn off the offending cells – actually physically fixing the problem. He could not because of the location. He was also concerned about the physical structures of the heart and wanted more tests.
Thursday Dr Cohn did a study of the plumbing. An arteriogram. It was pretty cool to see the pictures of my heart muscles an arteries filling with dye and standing out clearly on the screen. But the results of the study were not so cool. They discovered a weakness, a cardiomyopathy of the heart. This was the reason I was prone to the arrhythmias. This was a sickness that could be getting better or worse. No one knew.
That same day Dr Salerno implanted a defibrillator in my chest. A computer the size of half a yo yo that would keep track of my heart. If it started acting up it would try to use a pace-making function to trick it back into normal. If that didn’t work it would give my chest a kick. He wanted to give me some independence, to let me go hiking in the woods and not feel like I always had to be 20 minutes from a hospital. But he also gave me a prescription – heart medicine that I will probably take the rest of my life.
I came home on Friday – 6 days after entering the Hospital. I had gone in on a 92 degree day and I left in the chilly clear fall. It took me a few days to want to get out of the house, a week to drive again, but I was back working (from home) on Monday. I was recovering. Physical recovery was pretty quick. There are other aspects taking a much longer time.
Posted by rob at 10:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Diciembre 10, 2007
Memoir of a Heart Attack
This is a memoir of a heart attack, or better said, an extended episode of Ventricular Tachycardia. This is the memoir of near death and of ongoing life. There are huge emotional ramifications to this event that I am still uncovering in my life. But I before reflecting on them, I need to get the basic details out first.
On October 6, 2007 I rode 100 miles in the Sequatchie Valley. An organized ride, well attended, well supported. I rode the last 40 or 50 miles by myself because most riders only rode a metric century and because there were no groups I was able to join and stay with. It was also 92 degrees and I had a hard time drinking enough. My stomach just didn’t react well to fluids and I wasn’t very forceful about pushing them down. At the church in Kimball I knew I was cooking hot and still had 30 miles to go. I finished going down through the towns of Whitwell and Sequatchie fearing every hill that rose up in front of me. Hoping I’d find friends but not finding any. Not drinking like I should.
I finished with a time of 6:45. With gratitude I got back to my truck. Laid out in the grass, limped off to the shower and rested in its coolness. I went back to my truck to put my stuff away, before going to eat and drink inside the Marion county high school. An unexpected gust of wind took a sock out of my grasp and push it away from the open door and under my truck so that I had to lean over and see it (where it was under the back wheel).
Standing up from finding the sock – I felt the rush, the spin, the darkness and the next thing I knew I was on the floor and several were attending to me. They shaded me and got me some water and helped me. At that point, and maybe sooner my heart went into an arrhythmia. It started short circuiting so that only the lower ventricles were pumping, and pumping very fast. No one took my pulse, no one really pushed at my condition at the high school, and I really didn't want anyone to. I kept saying I was fine. So after something to eat and more to drink I limped back to the truck and drove home, about 40 minutes away.
I knew I wasn’t 100 percent. I knew that I was tired and very dazed, but I made it home. Traffic jammed up at the usual spot on the bridge over the Tennessee river, but I just followed a truck calmly all the way home. I remember the relief of turning off the interstate on Germantown road. I was not really all there, but I was making it and would be fine when I got home.
Well I wasn’t.
I went to lay down upstairs and sleep off the effort while Marialice moved the kids out the door. She was off to friends for dinner with the kids. Keeping engagements previously planned. I was suffering, but she’s seen me suffer and be tired and want just to sleep. I didn’t really want to ask for her help, but I did. I called out, "Marialice, I'm not doing well" Why did I ask for help? I don’t know – but it saved my life.
What was happening? It was déjà vu for me of what had happened in Colorado when I had an episode of altitude sickness. The discomfort and heavy heartbeat. I knew the feeling – dizzy, sweaty, hot, uncomfortable, absent. It wasn’t till I lay down that I felt my heart thumping hard. I’m not sure I had identified any other particular symptom before that. There had been no single sensation other than the tiredness and dehydrated exhaustion. But now it felt familiar.
But those symptoms could not explained by altitude sickness. This was not that. I couldn’t figure out what they were. So I called Marialice. She came right up and said, “lets call Kathy Tun” who is our neighborhood friend / pediatrician.
Kathy came over right away and displayed the most straightforward professional calmness. She took my pulse in two places, tried twice to get my blood pressure right. Then she told me in steely determination that she was going to call the ambulance. "Why, I can get to the hospital by myself…"
"No! we’re calling the ambulance."
Then they left to get things arranged and I walked over to get the computer. I was sitting up reading soccer scores when Kathy came back up and read me the riot act. "You have to lay down." She never explained why, she just told me what to do. A minute later I threw up.
The EMT’s came and we walked down the stairs… I was ok, conscious and willing, able to do all they asked. They got me on a gurney to roll down the sidewalk from the front door to the ambulance. Once inside they hooked up the EKG and told Marialice that we were going to run hot to the hospital and that she couldn’t follow. They told me that they were just worried about some irregularities, but I didn't really understood what was happening. No one told me that my heart was running at 220 bpm. I was cold from the AC they were running hard in the ambulance, and I couldn’t stand the diesel fumes as we idled in the driveway. They started a IV line.
When we got to the ER I threw up again. They hooked me back up again and we started waiting. The ER staff told me they were going to try to convert my heart rate with drugs. My heart rate was setting off all the alarms on the monitors. I was joking with the nurses and the technicians about the Tennessee game. I felt the same dis-ease, but was not really hurting. I was uncomfortable but was not feeling critical. I really didn’t know what was happening. The drugs didn’t work.
Marialice got there and met Linda Jones coming off her shift in the lobby. Linda turned right around and stood with her through the whole affair. She called her husband and in less than an hour Brad Jones and Alvin Huffine were with us in the ER. They called other elders in the church. I appreciated their company. They kept turning off the heart rate alarm.
There started to grow a pressure in my chest. It felt like someone was standing on my chest. I threw up one more time, and it felt good when I sat up, it relieved the pressure. But the ER staff wanted me to laying back down, actually with my head lower than my body. So back into the pressure I went. It started feeling like I had a ton of weight on my chest.
Eventually the on-call cardiologist got there. I think he was at Erlanger watching something else and he had to come across town. Once he got there he took over. “We’re going to take care of this.” The visitors left. They gave me a sedative in my IV. I didn’t really feel any different but very quickly the team asked “Are you ready?” Well go ahead… BAM! I didn’t realize that they had already hooked up the pads to my chest. I was expecting some sort of paddles, but they just pushed a button, and shocked me off the table. Shocked all the air out of my lungs in one big groan.
Immediately I felt better. When Marialice came back into the room, I said “That felt good, I could do it again.” She told me that she wanted to hit me in the head with a 2x4. Things turned around pretty good and quick. I wanted to go home, but the cardiologist told me that I’d stay until they figured out what was going on. Before too long they wheeled me off to CCU.
As we settled in the CCU, Marialice told me that the ER doctor stated that I was very close to death. A typically conditioned heart would not have survived a VTach like that for several hours. My heart really almost stopped, but it didn’t, because I had done so much endurance athletics. I was safe.
Over the next week we uncovered the physical ramifications and causes of that VTach. Over the next few months we have been uncovering the emotional and spiritual ramifications of that day. This is a journey I am walking through that I want to write about and think about.
Maybe you want to walk through it with me.
Posted by rob at 10:40 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Diciembre 09, 2007
So that's how it looked
Driving home today with Liliana we were watching the sun and clouds. She says "Papi, those clouds over there, they are all yellow the way the were in Jesus day"
Hmm.. "So were the clouds yellow when Jesus was born?"
"No Papi, when Jesus went up to heaven that's the way it looked. It's in the Bible. The picture shows it that way. The yellow clouds and the big white spot!"
OK... some work on editions, textual verification, hermeneutics.... All coming up for my 5 year old.
Posted by rob at 04:45 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Diciembre 01, 2007
The Year's Rides
2007 was the year of the bike ride. I fell in love with riding in 2006, but determined in January that in 2007 I was going to accomplish some big rides.
My big rides for the year were three centuries.
1. Three State Three Mountain - 100 miles, May 5. Suck Creek Mountain, Sand Mountain, Burkhalter Gap (Lookout Mountain). Bunch of mechanical problems with spokes, dérailleurs and tires. But I finished in 7.24. Not the first not the worst.
2. Open Arms Challenge - 100 miles, September 8. No big climbs, but nice North Hamilton and Bradley County terrain. First 50 rode with a great bunch of SCV guys, second 50 was a solo time trial. Hardest 5 miles were the last ones, into a headwind after having crossed Mahan gap. Finished right at 6 hours.
3. Sequatchie Valley Century - 100 miles, October 6. Pitts Gap climb. Great group ride for first 40 miles, but most turned off for the metric and I suffered alone through the rest of the day. I finished at 6:45, which felt really good. It was a rare 92 degree day and bad water made for a bad combination and I got pretty dehydrated. That started another much longer story which is coming soon.
Other big rides for the year:
4. Highlands of Alabama - 50 miles, April 3. I only made one climb of Lookout Mountain. I intended to make at least 75 and maybe 100 of this route. But 25 degrees with lots of wind took me right out of it. There was snow on Lookout. The last 10 miles into headwinds across Lookout mountain were pretty demoralizing.
5. Tour de Cure - 75 miles. May 19 I think this was my best ride of the year. 4 of us worked really well and had a great ride. I think I averaged 19 for the ride (which is pretty fast for me) even though I played Eveready bunny for a while at the end, dropping off and catching back on. We got to the finish line in Rome as a group, but it was 5 minutes earlier than my Family was there, so no cheering section. (dang!). For more see the slide show.
6. Prep rides for 3 state - Two big rides, both over 70 miles in March and April. One started with the metric and added rides to and from home. The other was the reverse 2 mountain. Good base rides with good people.
7. Tour de College Station - Ride with Bryant Haynes from his farm in College Station to the top of the Sequatchie Valley and back. Very liesurly summer day in the valley. For more see the slide show:
8. Various SCV rides. Henson and Pitts gap was memorable on a cold February morning. I was the last climber on both and the group was kind to give me directions on coming home.
I ended up with several thousand miles on my bike last year. (I guess 1800 - 2000 miles). A good year that ended in October. The rides were all a prelude to the exertion that started in October.
Posted by rob at 09:56 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack