March 18, 2025 • 33 mins
Sarah has had quite a bit going on over the past couple of weeks, and Laura interviews her about these events and how she's doing now in this episode. They talk about the challenges of planning ahead when there's more uncertainty, and the ways it can be helpful to pivot when things don't go according to plan.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm Laura Vanderkamp. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist,
and speaker.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
And I'm Sarah Hart Hunger, a mother of three, practicing physician, writer,
and course creator. We are two working parents who love
our careers and our families.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about
how real women manage work, family, and time for fun,
from figuring out childcare to mapping out long.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Term career goals.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
We want you to get the most out of life.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
This episode is airing in mid March of twenty twenty five.
I am coming at you live from Sarah's fancy recording
studio also known as her closet. We are here in
Fort Lauderdale together, Sarah. I feel like we've taken our
relationship to a whole new level.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
No, because I have recorded in your fancy recording studio
otherwise known as.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I don't know if it's a closet, it's a closet,
it's not big.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
So we have reached this level of microphone intimacy before,
just in.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
A different location.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
We have both been in each other's closets now recording
which in case anyone is wondering, it tends to be
better sound quality in an enclosed space. And so you
have a lot of podcasters who if you're not in
a real recording studio, which we have not yet attained
that level, I guess we are in our closets. But anyway,
we're here together in Fort Lauderdale, which is really really exciting.
(01:35):
I am glad to be here with Sarah. It's always
fun to come visit her, and especially good to see
her this time up and moving around. For those who've
been following her blog, we know that she had a
pretty major health incident a few weeks ago. So Sarah,
maybe you could just give the quick version of that.
I mean, if there is a quick version. I don't
know that there is.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Oh wow, the quick version. It's not gonna be that
quick because it's okay, but I'll give it. We've got time.
We've got thirty five minutes.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
That's true, all right, So and I won't be that
long either. So some of you already know this stuff
if you listen to Best Laid Plans, if you read
the blog, but just in case you don't, I had
an incident after running a half marathon in early March.
It was the Miami Beach Half called the three h
five Half, and you know, it was just like another
race for me. I don't even know how many halfs
I've run, like, I have not counted them at this point,
(02:24):
but it's got to be twenty or more. And I
run that distance like almost every weekend, just as a routine.
But it was a race, so you know, I went in.
There have been some stressful stuff going on, nothing terrible,
like fun stuff. I had come back from a speaking engagement,
I went to a gymnastics meet the day before, so
just a lot going on, but nothing terribly unusual. And
we stayed at Josh's parents the night before so that
the kids could hang out with their grandparents and we
(02:46):
could run this race and not have to get up
so early in drive to Miami Beach, and the race
itself was going good. It was about sixty five degrees,
which is for us really nice. Humunity was low, so
everyone was like, WHOA, this is amazing. We can actually
run for once and not just be driven down by
the heat. And my goal was to run like around
a one forty five, so I was kind of aiming
(03:06):
for like sub eight minute pace.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
And my plan was going off fine.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
I was like a little tired and noticing my heart
rate was like a little bit on the higher end
on my watch.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Than what I would have expected. At the paces.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
I was running, but nothing bad, and I figured, you
know what, like it's not totally cool out, and you know,
I just didn't think much of it. But I was
going up. You go up bridges during this race. There
are actually four times that you go like back and
forth across from like the mainland. The geography escapes me exactly,
but you're going up and down these bridges four times,
and so that's the most challenging part. Otherwise it's flat.
And the fourth one, I guess I said to myself,
(03:39):
Oh man, I thought there were only three somehow, but
I guess we.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Have another one.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
And I'm doing fine, and like suddenly it was like
a switch turn on. I'm like, oh, I'm not fine.
Something's wrong. Like I guess I'm hitting a wall. Oh
my god, my husband talks about hitting a wall like
runners talk about hitting a wall and a marathon, and
I guess that's it. Because I can't breathe and I
can't go anymore. And you know, I had been going
like very solidly, steadily around like seven to fifty five,
(04:04):
eight minutes, like right where I wanted to be, and
I just like.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Could not do that.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
So I start walking and I start jogging and still
feeling terrible. Like normally, if you're going to give up
and then you're going to run a ten minute mile
after you've been running eight, you would think, well, at
least now I'm going to be able to breathe.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Right. I'm sad, but I can.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
But I still didn't feel right. And I got to
the end of the race and I was like, okay,
well I'm done. Now my body can calm down. I
don't know what the heck just happened, but that was
so sad, and man, I ran a one fifty that sucks,
like it's not what I wanted. And my friend passed me,
and you know, I'm thinking all this stuff, and then
I'm like, but like, why isn't my heart slowing down?
Like why do I feel like I'm still running and
(04:39):
I'm standing still, Okay, I need to sit down for
a little bit longer. And I find my friend, my
lovely friend Tracy, who did amazing in that race.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
She's the one who passed me. She had a great race,
and she's.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
Like, you don't seem quite great, Like, let's go find
the medical tent. So she like helped me find it,
which is good because like I was kind of like
in distress already, and I don't know if I would
have been able to get there very well. Well, Josh
had already finished like ten minutes before. I'm celebrating with
some friends, but we called him and he's like, okay,
I'm coming right over.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
And I go in there and they put.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
A pul sox on me, and they put a blood
pressure cuf on and the pul sox says, Okay, you're
like satting ninety eight percent, your pulse is eighty something,
your blood pressure is like nineties over sixties. You're like, eh,
you're a little degagraated.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
That's fine.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
And I'm like, okay, that makes sense. Like I think
I'm maybe okay, and I start to walk away. But
then I started to feel like I really couldn't breathe,
like I was shorter of breath, Like I've never really
had shortness of breath. I've seen it lots, you know,
as a clinician. But I'm like, I think I'm having
an allergic reaction or anaphleaxis, cause I feel like my
airways closing and my chest feels like it hurts, and
(05:42):
I don't know what I'm reacting to, but I need
to go back. So like we'd goten like ten feet away,
but we walked back and they're like, okay, this time,
sit down and we'll put the leads on you, like
the little cardiac leads. I'm like the second they did that,
everyone was like like there was like things had changed,
Like everyone was like, oh, this is not good, Like
we are intro because I guess my heart rate was
going like over two fifty and the pull sox just
(06:04):
hadn't picked up on it. I guess because my pulses
hadn't been making it all the way to my finger
or what the pull sox was. But my heart was
showing this like rate of over two fifty and it
looked funky. I knew enough to be like, Okay, that's
very bad, and they're gonna like code me and stuff
is gonna happen. And sure enough, I started feeling more
and more dizzy, and my blood pressure is dropping and
(06:24):
just a series of events, I'm getting on a stretcher
and they're taking me to an ambulance and sticking ivs
in me.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Really harrowing ride. I was awake the whole time, so
it was not even like I passed out and got
to miss out on this experience.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
I was very dizzy and lightheaded, but like still there,
and I kept hearing them say something about shocking, and
I'm like.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Do not shock me. I am awake.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
I cannot be shocked. I've never seen anyone shocked awake.
I mean maybe people are shocked awake. I actually haven't
gone back to looked that. It was just horrifying to me,
the idea that I would be like electrocuted while I
could still talk right, even if my vitals looked bad.
And we're like in the ambulance and I'm think gave
me two doses of a medicine called dniscene, which if
you have something called super ventricular taket cardia, often it
(07:05):
will help stop it if you don't maybe even if
you do, but it makes you feel like you're gonna die.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
So I like, what like you can't breathe or you
can't or you just feel.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
Pad he like starts to go black and you feel
like your heart is stopping, and in that context, I
was like maybe I am actually dying, and I'm like
some sort of yeah, and I'm like saying, I love you,
I love the kids, like I need to be alive
for my babies, like please like make this stop. And
we get to the hospital, which was pretty close. I mean,
they had the sirens on and everything, and I think
it was like ten minute ride or maybe less because
(07:34):
mounts On Hospital in mind.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Maybe it's just pretty close to where the race was.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And they get me the er and I'm like, okay.
The doctors are here, like they're like, we have to
shock you, and I'm.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Like, just put me asleep. I guess I acknowledge the most.
Josh and the ambulance with yeah, yes, and he was
like terrified.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
I mean he was like he said he lost all
of his medical skills during that time because.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
He just couldn't like think of that type of stuff.
Speaker 3 (07:55):
And they were able to get an iv in give
me a dose of medicine to like make me not
asleep but like amnestic yeah, so that I wouldn't remember
the experience the dose over said, and I got shocked
and it worked, so Josh said immediately was like what happened.
My heart rate went from two sixty five to like
eighty yeah, no, like right, just like it's supposed to.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
And I think in retrospect that I probably had been
in that crazy rhythm for like a long time, like
for maybe from the race, or maybe I was off
and on during the race when I was finishing it
all the way that whole time in the medical tent,
et cetera. My blood pressure got as low as like
sixties or ver thirties or something terrible. It was a
lot the labs they drew labs on me, which looked insane.
(08:42):
I'm like, that's what sick people's labs look like. So
I was kind of like the definition of like cardio
headed towards like CARDI you ding shock or whatever. And
that was a lot in my completely boring health history
of a life.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
I yeah, because you didn't.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Have any really like I mean, you didn't have much
warning that this was and that happened.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
I had no warning.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
I mean I am like healthy, like I have normal
blood pressure, I have a really low resting heart rate.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
I say that there's two clues.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
And just in case anyone's listening to this, it's like
I'm worried this could happen to me, which it probably won't,
but like it could, these things do happen. The two
warning signs I had where that I did have one
race five years ago or had the same thing happen.
It wasn't as bad, it went away on its own,
but it was like really fast heartbeat that I felt
like I couldn't control, and short of breath that it
(09:27):
lasted for like over a half hour after I had
stopped running, and I was going to bring it up
with my doctor, like I remember, but.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Then I think COVID happened.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
This was twenty twenty pre COVID, like January, and then
I don't think it ever turned into anything. And honestly,
even if I had, I'm not sure they would have
found anything at the time because some of my initial
testing was normal anyway, even this time, so who knows
if that would have come to anything. But I did
have one prior episode, so I'd say do not ignore
shortness of breath or weird heart stuff.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
That is triggered by exercise.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
And the other thing is I do have a lot
of what's known as PVC's or like extra beats. I
kind of always had, and I had actually noticed them
like a little more than normal in the feud actually
at a conference, mean like you just feel your heart
like skip a beat or like like you feel a
little palpitation, and then maybe you're like, oh that's weird.
I'll feel my pulse and it's just like weirdly like irregular,
(10:17):
like you'll feel like beat beat beat, like and you anyway, yeah,
like extra beats. They're called like PVCs, and they can
be normal and a lot of people have them. A
caffeine can make them worse than some people. But I
had like actually when I was at that conference. I
was at a conference in Texas speaking and I was
went to some of the sessions, and I guess I
think I noticed it more when I'm just sitting still.
Plus I did drink coffee, probably more than normal because
(10:39):
I was like at a conference, that's what you do, right,
And I just noticed them.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
So that's like my one other maybe clue. But other
than that, no, nothing, Yeah, I.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Mean because you were running like fifty sixty miles a
week pretty fast and not having this happen and like
on a daily.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
So many races. I've run two marathons in last year.
I didn't have this issue.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
I've run many really fast paced training runs. I mean,
I guess the only difference with the half is like
a faster pace for.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Like a little bit more. But I wasn't even like
I wasn't dying in that race.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
I actually was sort of thinking to myself, Oh, this
feels good, Like I feel like I'm kind of going
marathon pace. I'm not gonna push too hard. Let me
just see what my splits end up. It didn't feel
like a heroic effort until the part where I couldn't
do it anymore.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
Yeah, yeah, now that's well, who knows. I mean, these
things happen so randomly. I mean, it's not like there's
one thing that probably caused it.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
They do, and there's a lot of underlying things that
can cause us. And I still don't one hundred percent
know why this happened to me. I did have quite
a work up when I was in the hospital for
about a week, CT scan, MRI echo cath to look
at my cornarys cath to do an EP study and
find out how like a rhythmegenic my heart is. So
(11:48):
all those things put together and it does turn out
like it was kind of a shock to me because
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
I'm just used to getting like.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
Medically good news or like medically benign news, and stuff
came back that I do have some abnormal all my
imaging that and on my rhythm study that I was
kind of more prone to a rhythmias than they expected,
like they were able to induce them, I guess very easily.
And then also some just changes in the way the
walls of my heart looked and the ways of the walls
of my heart moved, and the sizes of the chambers.
(12:16):
Now you can get some like athletic remodeling, So that
can be confusing, like people who are training can actually
get like normal physiologic enlargement of certain chambers of the heart.
So they had to really carefully try to figure out,
like is what they're seeing in me that or is
it like more than that. They consulted with some experts
and stuff, and right now the consensus is it's more
than that. It's not that we don't know exactly what
(12:36):
the underlying thing is. It might be something called a
rhythmogenic right ventricular displaysia, which is actually more commonly seen
in athletes because being very active as tends to be
what brings out the phenotype and people that are predisposed
in it, but we don't know for sure yet, and
so I'm still kind of in the question answering phase.
And the other things they're thinking about is like, could
(12:57):
it have been like an old myocarditis that caused changes
in my heart and even some other really weird, rare things.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
And I'm not even gonna mention all sorts of wonderful things.
None of it's great. Yeah, yeah, we like to be normal. Yes,
normal is good.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
All right, Well we're gonna take a quick ad break
and then be back hearing a little bit more from
Sarah about her experience.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Well, we are back.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
We've been talking with Sarah about her very scary incident
after her half marathon where she wound up in the
hospital for a week after a heart incident. So maybe
you can talk a little bit more about what came
out of that and what your current setup is.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
Yes, so this all felt like was happening really really fast,
because it was I mean, you know, I went from
like no medical history, nothing exciting to like, your heart's
not right in a very short period of time. And
the doctors felt pretty strongly as well as my husband
and talking with very like we actually ended up like
(14:10):
consulting that doctors who work with my health system in
addition to the ones where I was because we have
access to them. I feel super, super lucky and privileged
that I was able to get not only just care,
but like even multiple expert voices of care in the moment,
which was amazing. But everyone felt really confident, not necessarily
with the underlying issue, but that I needed a implanted
defibrillator because I guess like the amount that it took
(14:32):
to trigger more a rhythmias during the rhythm study wasn't
a safe amount. So we looked at the different ones
and based on what they thought I might have and
kind of thinking ahead to the future and like procedures
that I could need or not need, we decided on
a subcutaneous ICD. So I have a implanted ICD now
that I had put in just a few days ago
(14:54):
as we're recording this, So I had my first surgery ever.
I'm healing from that and I don't know what that's
going to be like yet. I feel like it's too soon.
I'm still like literally healing from the incisions and there's
swelling and there's pain. So I do not think this
is my long term reality, but I do know that
as a pretty small person, I think I'm going to
(15:15):
have a weird outline thing on my body to remind me.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
That it's there.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
It's not going to be so easy to totally forget
about it. But I also know that it's there because
if my heart ever decides to do something crazy again,
it can help me right in the moment and prevent
something terrible from happening. And they even tested it out,
so apparently when they put it in this type, they
want to make sure it works because it's subc it's
not in the heart, it's like on top of the heart.
(15:39):
The leads go and so they like put you into
VTACK or I think even v FIB during the procedure
and then they shock you out of it and it worked.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
It worked. Well, that's good.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
I mean, so just you know, practical questions here with
the device, like do the batteries run out?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Like how is it operating? How is this going on?
Speaker 3 (15:58):
Yeah, so I believe the bats last on average eight years, okay,
and so you just get it replaced. So I will
have to schedule surgery for twenty thirty whatever, twenty thirty
three years. So but that's down average. I think sometimes
it's longer and sometimes it's shorter. I think it's under
warranty for six warranty. Warranties are nice kind of like
a used car or something.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Oh, dear, dear, And you know, is that like when
you go through metal detectors.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Is that going to be a thing as well?
Speaker 3 (16:27):
Yes, they said, don't go through metal detectors, like you
have to request like a pat down. I don't know,
like if there's like if you do, just make sure.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
You don't linger run through, except don't run right right.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
Yeah, we'll get to that, but yeah, yeah, yeah, like yes,
but I think in general, my policy instead of being like,
oh I can go through, but I can go fast,
it's just gonna be like, no, I have a thingy whatever,
pat me down, it's fine, and then saying yeah, like
the airport and concerts and stuff like that. And there's
some other really random stuff like they say like don't
use like a body fat scale, like you know those
are everywhere, yeah, and like we have one, and I'm like,
(17:00):
oh my god, don't.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Step on that, like don't forget.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
Yeah, yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
Mean again, I think a lot of these things are
probably like not super high risk. But at the same time,
I'm like, if I accidentally shock myself, I'll.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Be really sad. Yeah, so yeah, you gonna.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Try to be follow all the directions, try to avoid
that if at all possible. So you're resting, relaxing as
much as as possible in your life right here.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yeah, I'm still like tired, Like I'm still I'm honestly
still like in post up pain.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
To some extent.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
Today has been okay, Like I haven't even taken anything
other than I yourprofene like a few hours ago, and
I'm feeling pretty good. But I had to take like
a long nap this morning because I slept so badly
because of pain. So just not like back yet. My
thought is I'll probably have two weeks away from clinical
work from the date of the surgery, which I think
should be enough because it's not super super invasive, and
(17:49):
I'm my hope is to go back feeling like pretty
good rather than like limping on in there and kind
of being halfway there. So yeah, but podcasting, I mean, listen,
it's talking.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
I love to talk.
Speaker 3 (18:00):
It's like therapeutic. It away, so that kind of work.
I don't mind.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
Going back, don't mind going back to that's good. So yeah, yeah,
now I'm excited to be here. I'm getting to see
Sarah's house and experience the places that I've I've actually
only seen through like the zoom camera because I hadn't
been here before.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
You know, it's funny because I've been to your house
a bunch, so this is actually kind of cool.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Yeah, Well, Sarah's parents live pretty near to me, so
she has many reasons to come up and visit. But
I'm sure it's still like a huge adjustment and it's
your family been all doing okay.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
Yeah, they're doing okay.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
I mean we did a lot of frequent like text
chain updates and stuff like that. Josh kind of took
over a lot of that. But yeah, everyone seems okay.
I had the shower of love I got from like friends, family,
community members, blog readers, et cetera. Has been like totally
amazing and unexpected and not even like I just feel
bad like people are sending me on I'm like, you
don't need to do this, like thank you.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
No, It's been wonderful.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
It makes me just recognize, like what a wonderful community
has been built out of doing stuff out there in
the world, and I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Well, and we'll talk about this a little bit in
the question section of this. But you know, there's this
tension between planning and like life happens, of course, and
you can't plan for big things, unexpected things to happen.
But on the other hand, that doesn't mean that planning
(19:30):
is useless and not worth it either. And so I
feel like sometimes when big things happen, people come at
this it's like we'll see you know, you we make
our plans and God laughs. But no, because then just
even stuff like making sure like your daughter still got
her braces off at the right time, like a big
milestone for that, even in the middle of all this,
(19:52):
like all the good systems make that happen.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
Yeah, I definitely do not regret any of the past
planning I've done, nor do I like feel like, oh, well,
that was dumb. I wanted to you know, just because
my twenty twenty five goals had running related goals on
them make all of them worthless. I mean, first of all,
I always go in knowing I'm not going to meet
every goal, like maybe Laura.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
Doesn't, but I don't.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Ever.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
I don't meet every goal. No, No, I know that.
Speaker 3 (20:17):
I definitely I think you sometimes aim more to meet
every goal. But I have like an open mind about like,
you know, this is what I'm thinking about, and if
I meet like a good amount of these, like, that's amazing.
But you wouldn't be here right now. We wouldn't actually
be having this time if we hadn't plan on it.
And even though it looks different, I'm still really really
glad like we planned it. Yeah, it's working out nice,
and it turns out that actually I'm getting some really
nice distraction.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Even then we would have been.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
At the beach, So that's all right. Planning can pause
and you could take time to wallow. I have a
whole chapter about like I'm gonna read my own chapter.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
Chapter you reach your own chapter on wallowings.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
No, but really I have a chapter on like when
things are hard, and like I talk about wallowing, and
I talk about like taking a minute to just like
regroup and letting yourself go slowly and all those kinds
of things, and those all apply, and you can still
plan and use planning to help you kind of recover
from something like this rather than be mad at the
fact that you did it in the first place.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
Yeah, well, we're going to take one more quick ad
break and then we'll be back with a little bit
more about this topic. Well, we are back talking about
life updates, Sarah, you know, adjusting to the new normal
(21:32):
with being a I don't know, being a cardiac patient,
being a cardiac patient. But you know, it's like we
could hold two thoughts in mind simultaneously, Hairy. One is that,
you know, we're all so grateful that things did not
go worse, that you got medical help quickly, that people
(21:53):
recognized what was going on, you were in a place
where that could happen, as opposed to like ten miles
from the house on a long on at four am
that you were doing on your own, where nobody would
have noticed or something until all that, So we could
be grateful for that. We can also just realize, like
everything about this sucks, Like there's just you know, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
And it's hard, like you know, there's no like suck Olympics.
Speaker 3 (22:16):
Like part of me is like, well I wish it
was this condition, are like, well that's worse than it's like,
you know what, that all sucks it all sucks, all
of it, and there's no like even real like comparisons
to be made or anything. And one piece of the
suckage that Laura hasn't mentioned because I thinks she's not
sure whether she should mention or not, is that I
probably cannot run anymore. Don't know for sure, but if
(22:38):
the diagnosis is what they think it is, exercise has
been shown to cause further remodeling of the heart in
a maladaptive way and can lead to heart failure over time.
Now I don't again, don't know for sure, so maybe
like there's like this chance they'll be like, actually it
was my ocarditis and that doesn't apply to you, and
like whatever. I don't think it's healthy for me to
hold on to that hope because I don't think it's
(22:58):
super high. But I'm just you know, I'll keep an
air of uncertainty there because it is there. But if
it is that, and certainly until we figure out that
it's not that, I can't really run, like won't be
able to do even like high intensity spinning. And before
you're like that can't possibly be true. I mean, of
course we don't know everything, but it looks like there
is enough research on this specific thing where the top
(23:20):
centers kind of really recommend very specific amounts of exercise
that are not what I was used to doing anywhere
close would I be able to maybe sometimes do a
slow three mile run, like maybe great, But it's going
to be a change.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
It's going to be a an enormous change.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
So I am grappling with that because it is nowhere
near it's important as being alive and being with my family,
and it's still like an annoying, crappy loss that is
going to change my lifestyle a lot, because I just
really have always loved to be active, Like I never
really had a long period of my life where I
wasn't working out most days for a significant amount of time,
(23:59):
and I feel like I was like really relied on
that like hormonal endorphin kind of whatever it was.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
It's not.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
It hasn't always been running, and there have been periods
where I've done a lot lot less. Like actually, I
look back on my infertility period when I was mostly
going to yoga, and I was like, you know what,
other than the infertility part, I kind of liked that lifestyle,
Like it wasn't that bad. So I'm glad I actually
have that to refer to and think about.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
So you've been through this before in the sense of
remodeling sort of your identity differents like I canun.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
Yeah, I can like feel active and enjoy life and
didn't really have like some huge gap in my my
existence when I wasn't running during that time. So, and
I didn't run that much when my kids were little either,
So I'm actually really glad that I've had breaks in
my life at the same time in the last two
years or so, it's been a huge source of joy.
(24:49):
And you know, I always wanted to be Q which
is Boston qualify, and then I finally did. And now
even if my time from Jacksonville Marathon in December makes it,
I like, I'm not going to submit it because I'm
not gonna be able to run the race.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
And that's that sucks that you qualified?
Speaker 2 (25:04):
You qualified? Yeah, yeah, you know, no, it's rough. Well,
we need to find you a new nine to ten
hour a week hobby. I guess I know what could
it be.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
I don't know. Maybe I'll write some more, write more books.
I don't know. You can sing, I don't know, choir.
Maybe I'll just sleep a lot more.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Yeah, you don't have to get up at four fifteen
in the morning. That whatever hobby you're doing that may
not have to happen. Then maybe you know, play musical instruments.
You want to get violin back out.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Probably not probably not, okay, piano, maybe maybe piano. I
mean a few of those hours could be filled up
with like yoga, Yeah, yoga, that's true.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
We're gonna try some pilates, you know, all that kind
of stuff. Maybe more socials. I don't know, we'll see.
I'm not signing the hours yet, but it is a
fun thing to think about. Yeah, it's a positive.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Well, and again it's the holding two thoughts in mind
at the same point that you maybe things will be different.
I mean, medicine advances at a crazy rate. There will
be you know, you talk about making the appointment for
your surgery in twenty thirty three, but I can tell
you the device world will be different in twenty thirty
three than it.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Maybe you could just like shoot it in there.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
I know it'll be like AI powered entirely and like
a robot that like does I don't know. And then
you know, gene therapy if it is genetic, like there's
all sorts of things that will happen in the next
eight years that we just have no idea, and that's
one of the most exciting things. But you can have
that thought, but then also build your life in a
way where you can be happy now whatever that takes.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
Yeah, and I believe I'm I don't have a doubt
that I could be happy again, like I think I
might if I hadn't done it before.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
But I have done it before, so I could do
it again. You can do it again. Well, that's wonderful. Well,
I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
I'm glad that we are still able to be in
the closet recording that there is a March eighteenth episode
or whatever date this is of.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
And by the way, if you're listening to this and
you're like, I don't think she's even fully processed this,
you're absolutely right. We are now like ten days or
so out from the event, so I'm still just like
what happened, Like, Yeah, there's lots of pieces of me
that are still just trying to figure out how I feel.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
And that's okay. I'm going to give myself time for that.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
I think there's a time and a place for therapy
and I think this is it, and yeah, just well
be going forward from.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Here, going forward from here. I love it.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Well, our question for the week is actually related to this,
and I'll read it and then we can have Sarah's advice.
And this is just sort of like maybe how she's
giving her own advice to a degree. But this listener
writes in that she has a broken kneecap, can't walk
without crutches, this is an accident that happened, can't drive.
It's been really challenging to leave her house. They're up
(27:47):
a lot of steps. So basically she is going to
be staying home except for medical appointments, for the next
several months. Fortunately, her job has been able to convert
to be a one hundred percent work from home job,
which is very unfortunate. She's adjusting reasonably well to that situation,
she says, but most of her hopes and dreams for
(28:07):
other aspects of her life in twenty twenty five seem
to be lost. They were going to be taking a
European vacation as a family this summer, but it's hard
to know. Will she be able to walk around on
cobblestone types treats, you know, the various fitness goals, she had,
self care goals, friendship goals all seem out of reach.
She's still feeling kind of emotionally down about this whole thing.
(28:30):
It is grateful for advice on how to pull off
a major pivot when the things.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
You planned for the years seem like they might not
be happening. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
Well, there's a book coming out in January with a
whole chapter about this, and I definitely recommend that you
like pre order about ten copies because I'm just going.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
To give it to all your friends. I hear it's
called Best Slide Plans.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
Yes, So I mean yes, I one hundred percent like
I'm in the same place. And after the quote wallowing,
which I think can actually be helpful, just kind of
let yourself like not worry.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
About anything for a while, Like don't even.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Try to plan when you're just first contending with something,
but just like rest and watch TV and like soak
it in and like take a little bit of time
to process. And then once you've done that, I really
what I'm trying to do and what I have recommended
is to just like try to go short term first,
like not oh my god, I have to plan August
right now, and like will I be able to walk?
(29:19):
And like won't I be able to walk?
Speaker 1 (29:20):
And what can I do?
Speaker 3 (29:20):
But like, okay, what can I do this week? Like
what can I do tomorrow? What little joys can I
still fit into my life? How can I practice self
care tomorrow in the ways that I can, rather than
thinking too much about putting big goals or even like
pie in the sky ways of caring for myself like
for the long term. So I would focus yourself in
(29:42):
and then my other thing is to like get all
the support you can, like, don't feel bad. I noticed
there was like a little hinte of like, you know,
I did this to myself, but like you know, no
one wants to do that to themselves, So that needs
to just go. And I would lean on people who
want to help you, because they probably truly do want
to help you. And whether that is the support of
of paid caregivers or therapists or whatever, or just like
(30:03):
having your family help you a little bit more, you
should definitely accept that to the extent that you are
able to.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Yeah, good advice. That's where I am right now.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Yeah, yeah, well, and just I mean figuring out what
you can still do. I mean, and if it doesn't
happen to go to Europe this summer, you know that
that's something that you want to do as a family.
That's why you planned it for the summer, which means
that if it doesn't happen this summer, you make it
happen next summer, right, and by that time things will
probably look entirely different in terms of your recovery. You
(30:34):
said that you had friendship goals. I bet you can
still come up with fun things to do with friends
because people will come visit you.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
You have a very good excuse to not go to them.
You can make them all come to you.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
They can bring wine and snacks or board games or
whatever it is that you can all crouche together, who
knows whatever you like to do, right, You can do
that and figure out new physical goals that still work,
and as you're recovering from this knee injury, that it's
gonna look different than if you didn't have that. But
that doesn't mean you can't have anything that you are
(31:06):
aiming for and then just keep revisiting as things go along.
So yeah, but definitely nothing gained by like beating yourself
up about any of this.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
I mean, people do not cause their medical things like this.
I mean, you know, anyway, we won't go on that soapbox.
All right, Well, hopefully this has been something of a positive. Yes, yeah,
I know it's a little less raw than the one.
We're all we're all feeling a little yikes, yeah, a
(31:37):
little bit yikes.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
I'd have recorded an episode of Bestlay of Plans like
from the Hot partly because like it's probably dumb, but
I was like, well, I have an episode due and whatever.
I probably could have just done something else, but I
maybe I also wanted to like share the story, like, yeah,
a process. So this one's a little more calm because
I'm a whole like ten days out now, the.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Whole ten days out and in your closet and not
in the hospitals. So it's all feeling a little different,
all right, So.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Love of the weeks, Sarah. Yeah, shout out to the
super nice nurses I had.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
I mean they were all good, but like there were
just some total standouts.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
One of them her name was Sarah. She was awesome.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
She was telling me all about like COVID times and
how that's what was her very first job was working
in the ICUs during COVID and I can't even imagine,
but like, yeah, the nurses were just they made the
experience great.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
Like the way they were like really made a difference.
So that was great. And then my other I'm giving
two because whatever, we can have two loves of the week.
This Why is that.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Anvil's teeth are so straight? They're so pretty, Like I'm jealous.
She wore racist for a long time, and I you know,
I helped pay for them, so I feel like I
can take a little bit of credit. Oh and I
drove her to a lot of appointments.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
Yeah. Yeah, it's like your street teeth too. Yeah, if
they're in somebody else's mouth exactly. I'm going to say that.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
It's only a two hour and fifteen minute in the
air flight from Philadelphia to Fort Lauderdale, So you know,
I was in my house this morning and I'm in
Sarah's closet right now, and it's kind of cool how
that works. And yeah, I mean, air travel is amazing
and gets you far distances very very quickly, and that's
good because we can come see each other.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Yeah phl fll. It's done it many times, done it
many times.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
All right, Well we will be back next week with
more on making work and life fit together.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (33:16):
You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com
or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This
has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join
us next time for more on making work and life
work together.
Hi.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
I'm Laura Vanderkamp. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist,
and speaker.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
And I'm Sarah Hart Hunger, a mother of three, practicing physician, writer,
and course creator. We are two working parents who love
our careers and our families.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about
how real women manage work, family, and time for fun,
from figuring out childcare to mapping out long.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Term career goals.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
We want you to get the most out of life.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
This episode is airing in mid March of twenty twenty five.
I am coming at you live from Sarah's fancy recording
studio also known as her closet. We are here in
Fort Lauderdale together, Sarah. I feel like we've taken our
relationship to a whole new level.
Speaker 3 (01:00):
No, because I have recorded in your fancy recording studio
otherwise known as.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I don't know if it's a closet, it's a closet,
it's not big.
Speaker 3 (01:08):
So we have reached this level of microphone intimacy before,
just in.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
A different location.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
We have both been in each other's closets now recording
which in case anyone is wondering, it tends to be
better sound quality in an enclosed space. And so you
have a lot of podcasters who if you're not in
a real recording studio, which we have not yet attained
that level, I guess we are in our closets. But anyway,
we're here together in Fort Lauderdale, which is really really exciting.
(01:35):
I am glad to be here with Sarah. It's always
fun to come visit her, and especially good to see
her this time up and moving around. For those who've
been following her blog, we know that she had a
pretty major health incident a few weeks ago. So Sarah,
maybe you could just give the quick version of that.
I mean, if there is a quick version. I don't
know that there is.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
Oh wow, the quick version. It's not gonna be that
quick because it's okay, but I'll give it. We've got time.
We've got thirty five minutes.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
That's true, all right, So and I won't be that
long either. So some of you already know this stuff
if you listen to Best Laid Plans, if you read
the blog, but just in case you don't, I had
an incident after running a half marathon in early March.
It was the Miami Beach Half called the three h
five Half, and you know, it was just like another
race for me. I don't even know how many halfs
I've run, like, I have not counted them at this point,
(02:24):
but it's got to be twenty or more. And I
run that distance like almost every weekend, just as a routine.
But it was a race, so you know, I went in.
There have been some stressful stuff going on, nothing terrible,
like fun stuff. I had come back from a speaking engagement,
I went to a gymnastics meet the day before, so
just a lot going on, but nothing terribly unusual. And
we stayed at Josh's parents the night before so that
the kids could hang out with their grandparents and we
(02:46):
could run this race and not have to get up
so early in drive to Miami Beach, and the race
itself was going good. It was about sixty five degrees,
which is for us really nice. Humunity was low, so
everyone was like, WHOA, this is amazing. We can actually
run for once and not just be driven down by
the heat. And my goal was to run like around
a one forty five, so I was kind of aiming
(03:06):
for like sub eight minute pace.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
And my plan was going off fine.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
I was like a little tired and noticing my heart
rate was like a little bit on the higher end
on my watch.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Than what I would have expected. At the paces.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
I was running, but nothing bad, and I figured, you
know what, like it's not totally cool out, and you know,
I just didn't think much of it. But I was
going up. You go up bridges during this race. There
are actually four times that you go like back and
forth across from like the mainland. The geography escapes me exactly,
but you're going up and down these bridges four times,
and so that's the most challenging part. Otherwise it's flat.
And the fourth one, I guess I said to myself,
(03:39):
Oh man, I thought there were only three somehow, but
I guess we.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Have another one.
Speaker 3 (03:42):
And I'm doing fine, and like suddenly it was like
a switch turn on. I'm like, oh, I'm not fine.
Something's wrong. Like I guess I'm hitting a wall. Oh
my god, my husband talks about hitting a wall like
runners talk about hitting a wall and a marathon, and
I guess that's it. Because I can't breathe and I
can't go anymore. And you know, I had been going
like very solidly, steadily around like seven to fifty five,
(04:04):
eight minutes, like right where I wanted to be, and
I just like.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Could not do that.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
So I start walking and I start jogging and still
feeling terrible. Like normally, if you're going to give up
and then you're going to run a ten minute mile
after you've been running eight, you would think, well, at
least now I'm going to be able to breathe.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Right. I'm sad, but I can.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
But I still didn't feel right. And I got to
the end of the race and I was like, okay,
well I'm done. Now my body can calm down. I
don't know what the heck just happened, but that was
so sad, and man, I ran a one fifty that sucks,
like it's not what I wanted. And my friend passed me,
and you know, I'm thinking all this stuff, and then
I'm like, but like, why isn't my heart slowing down?
Like why do I feel like I'm still running and
(04:39):
I'm standing still, Okay, I need to sit down for
a little bit longer. And I find my friend, my
lovely friend Tracy, who did amazing in that race.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
She's the one who passed me. She had a great race,
and she's.
Speaker 3 (04:50):
Like, you don't seem quite great, Like, let's go find
the medical tent. So she like helped me find it,
which is good because like I was kind of like
in distress already, and I don't know if I would
have been able to get there very well. Well, Josh
had already finished like ten minutes before. I'm celebrating with
some friends, but we called him and he's like, okay,
I'm coming right over.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
And I go in there and they put.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
A pul sox on me, and they put a blood
pressure cuf on and the pul sox says, Okay, you're
like satting ninety eight percent, your pulse is eighty something,
your blood pressure is like nineties over sixties. You're like, eh,
you're a little degagraated.
Speaker 1 (05:20):
That's fine.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
And I'm like, okay, that makes sense. Like I think
I'm maybe okay, and I start to walk away. But
then I started to feel like I really couldn't breathe,
like I was shorter of breath, Like I've never really
had shortness of breath. I've seen it lots, you know,
as a clinician. But I'm like, I think I'm having
an allergic reaction or anaphleaxis, cause I feel like my
airways closing and my chest feels like it hurts, and
(05:42):
I don't know what I'm reacting to, but I need
to go back. So like we'd goten like ten feet away,
but we walked back and they're like, okay, this time,
sit down and we'll put the leads on you, like
the little cardiac leads. I'm like the second they did that,
everyone was like like there was like things had changed,
Like everyone was like, oh, this is not good, Like
we are intro because I guess my heart rate was
going like over two fifty and the pull sox just
(06:04):
hadn't picked up on it. I guess because my pulses
hadn't been making it all the way to my finger
or what the pull sox was. But my heart was
showing this like rate of over two fifty and it
looked funky. I knew enough to be like, Okay, that's
very bad, and they're gonna like code me and stuff
is gonna happen. And sure enough, I started feeling more
and more dizzy, and my blood pressure is dropping and
(06:24):
just a series of events, I'm getting on a stretcher
and they're taking me to an ambulance and sticking ivs
in me.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Really harrowing ride. I was awake the whole time, so
it was not even like I passed out and got
to miss out on this experience.
Speaker 3 (06:36):
I was very dizzy and lightheaded, but like still there,
and I kept hearing them say something about shocking, and
I'm like.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Do not shock me. I am awake.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
I cannot be shocked. I've never seen anyone shocked awake.
I mean maybe people are shocked awake. I actually haven't
gone back to looked that. It was just horrifying to me,
the idea that I would be like electrocuted while I
could still talk right, even if my vitals looked bad.
And we're like in the ambulance and I'm think gave
me two doses of a medicine called dniscene, which if
you have something called super ventricular taket cardia, often it
(07:05):
will help stop it if you don't maybe even if
you do, but it makes you feel like you're gonna die.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
So I like, what like you can't breathe or you
can't or you just feel.
Speaker 3 (07:13):
Pad he like starts to go black and you feel
like your heart is stopping, and in that context, I
was like maybe I am actually dying, and I'm like
some sort of yeah, and I'm like saying, I love you,
I love the kids, like I need to be alive
for my babies, like please like make this stop. And
we get to the hospital, which was pretty close. I mean,
they had the sirens on and everything, and I think
it was like ten minute ride or maybe less because
(07:34):
mounts On Hospital in mind.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Maybe it's just pretty close to where the race was.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And they get me the er and I'm like, okay.
The doctors are here, like they're like, we have to
shock you, and I'm.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Like, just put me asleep. I guess I acknowledge the most.
Josh and the ambulance with yeah, yes, and he was
like terrified.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
I mean he was like he said he lost all
of his medical skills during that time because.
Speaker 1 (07:52):
He just couldn't like think of that type of stuff.
Speaker 3 (07:55):
And they were able to get an iv in give
me a dose of medicine to like make me not
asleep but like amnestic yeah, so that I wouldn't remember
the experience the dose over said, and I got shocked
and it worked, so Josh said immediately was like what happened.
My heart rate went from two sixty five to like
eighty yeah, no, like right, just like it's supposed to.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
And I think in retrospect that I probably had been
in that crazy rhythm for like a long time, like
for maybe from the race, or maybe I was off
and on during the race when I was finishing it
all the way that whole time in the medical tent,
et cetera. My blood pressure got as low as like
sixties or ver thirties or something terrible. It was a
lot the labs they drew labs on me, which looked insane.
(08:42):
I'm like, that's what sick people's labs look like. So
I was kind of like the definition of like cardio
headed towards like CARDI you ding shock or whatever. And
that was a lot in my completely boring health history
of a life.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
I yeah, because you didn't.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Have any really like I mean, you didn't have much
warning that this was and that happened.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
I had no warning.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
I mean I am like healthy, like I have normal
blood pressure, I have a really low resting heart rate.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
I say that there's two clues.
Speaker 3 (09:07):
And just in case anyone's listening to this, it's like
I'm worried this could happen to me, which it probably won't,
but like it could, these things do happen. The two
warning signs I had where that I did have one
race five years ago or had the same thing happen.
It wasn't as bad, it went away on its own,
but it was like really fast heartbeat that I felt
like I couldn't control, and short of breath that it
(09:27):
lasted for like over a half hour after I had
stopped running, and I was going to bring it up
with my doctor, like I remember, but.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Then I think COVID happened.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
This was twenty twenty pre COVID, like January, and then
I don't think it ever turned into anything. And honestly,
even if I had, I'm not sure they would have
found anything at the time because some of my initial
testing was normal anyway, even this time, so who knows
if that would have come to anything. But I did
have one prior episode, so I'd say do not ignore
shortness of breath or weird heart stuff.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
That is triggered by exercise.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
And the other thing is I do have a lot
of what's known as PVC's or like extra beats. I
kind of always had, and I had actually noticed them
like a little more than normal in the feud actually
at a conference, mean like you just feel your heart
like skip a beat or like like you feel a
little palpitation, and then maybe you're like, oh that's weird.
I'll feel my pulse and it's just like weirdly like irregular,
(10:17):
like you'll feel like beat beat beat, like and you anyway, yeah,
like extra beats. They're called like PVCs, and they can
be normal and a lot of people have them. A
caffeine can make them worse than some people. But I
had like actually when I was at that conference. I
was at a conference in Texas speaking and I was
went to some of the sessions, and I guess I
think I noticed it more when I'm just sitting still.
Plus I did drink coffee, probably more than normal because
(10:39):
I was like at a conference, that's what you do, right,
And I just noticed them.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
So that's like my one other maybe clue. But other
than that, no, nothing, Yeah, I.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Mean because you were running like fifty sixty miles a
week pretty fast and not having this happen and like
on a daily.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
So many races. I've run two marathons in last year.
I didn't have this issue.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
I've run many really fast paced training runs. I mean,
I guess the only difference with the half is like
a faster pace for.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Like a little bit more. But I wasn't even like
I wasn't dying in that race.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
I actually was sort of thinking to myself, Oh, this
feels good, Like I feel like I'm kind of going
marathon pace. I'm not gonna push too hard. Let me
just see what my splits end up. It didn't feel
like a heroic effort until the part where I couldn't
do it anymore.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
Yeah, yeah, now that's well, who knows. I mean, these
things happen so randomly. I mean, it's not like there's
one thing that probably caused it.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
They do, and there's a lot of underlying things that
can cause us. And I still don't one hundred percent
know why this happened to me. I did have quite
a work up when I was in the hospital for
about a week, CT scan, MRI echo cath to look
at my cornarys cath to do an EP study and
find out how like a rhythmegenic my heart is. So
(11:48):
all those things put together and it does turn out
like it was kind of a shock to me because
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
I'm just used to getting like.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
Medically good news or like medically benign news, and stuff
came back that I do have some abnormal all my
imaging that and on my rhythm study that I was
kind of more prone to a rhythmias than they expected,
like they were able to induce them, I guess very easily.
And then also some just changes in the way the
walls of my heart looked and the ways of the walls
of my heart moved, and the sizes of the chambers.
(12:16):
Now you can get some like athletic remodeling, So that
can be confusing, like people who are training can actually
get like normal physiologic enlargement of certain chambers of the heart.
So they had to really carefully try to figure out,
like is what they're seeing in me that or is
it like more than that. They consulted with some experts
and stuff, and right now the consensus is it's more
than that. It's not that we don't know exactly what
(12:36):
the underlying thing is. It might be something called a
rhythmogenic right ventricular displaysia, which is actually more commonly seen
in athletes because being very active as tends to be
what brings out the phenotype and people that are predisposed
in it, but we don't know for sure yet, and
so I'm still kind of in the question answering phase.
And the other things they're thinking about is like, could
(12:57):
it have been like an old myocarditis that caused changes
in my heart and even some other really weird, rare things.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
And I'm not even gonna mention all sorts of wonderful things.
None of it's great. Yeah, yeah, we like to be normal. Yes,
normal is good.
Speaker 2 (13:12):
All right, Well we're gonna take a quick ad break
and then be back hearing a little bit more from
Sarah about her experience.
Speaker 1 (13:30):
Well, we are back.
Speaker 2 (13:31):
We've been talking with Sarah about her very scary incident
after her half marathon where she wound up in the
hospital for a week after a heart incident. So maybe
you can talk a little bit more about what came
out of that and what your current setup is.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
Yes, so this all felt like was happening really really fast,
because it was I mean, you know, I went from
like no medical history, nothing exciting to like, your heart's
not right in a very short period of time. And
the doctors felt pretty strongly as well as my husband
and talking with very like we actually ended up like
(14:10):
consulting that doctors who work with my health system in
addition to the ones where I was because we have
access to them. I feel super, super lucky and privileged
that I was able to get not only just care,
but like even multiple expert voices of care in the moment,
which was amazing. But everyone felt really confident, not necessarily
with the underlying issue, but that I needed a implanted
defibrillator because I guess like the amount that it took
(14:32):
to trigger more a rhythmias during the rhythm study wasn't
a safe amount. So we looked at the different ones
and based on what they thought I might have and
kind of thinking ahead to the future and like procedures
that I could need or not need, we decided on
a subcutaneous ICD. So I have a implanted ICD now
that I had put in just a few days ago
(14:54):
as we're recording this, So I had my first surgery ever.
I'm healing from that and I don't know what that's
going to be like yet. I feel like it's too soon.
I'm still like literally healing from the incisions and there's
swelling and there's pain. So I do not think this
is my long term reality, but I do know that
as a pretty small person, I think I'm going to
(15:15):
have a weird outline thing on my body to remind me.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
That it's there.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
It's not going to be so easy to totally forget
about it. But I also know that it's there because
if my heart ever decides to do something crazy again,
it can help me right in the moment and prevent
something terrible from happening. And they even tested it out,
so apparently when they put it in this type, they
want to make sure it works because it's subc it's
not in the heart, it's like on top of the heart.
(15:39):
The leads go and so they like put you into
VTACK or I think even v FIB during the procedure
and then they shock you out of it and it worked.
Speaker 1 (15:48):
It worked. Well, that's good.
Speaker 2 (15:50):
I mean, so just you know, practical questions here with
the device, like do the batteries run out?
Speaker 1 (15:56):
Like how is it operating? How is this going on?
Speaker 3 (15:58):
Yeah, so I believe the bats last on average eight years, okay,
and so you just get it replaced. So I will
have to schedule surgery for twenty thirty whatever, twenty thirty
three years. So but that's down average. I think sometimes
it's longer and sometimes it's shorter. I think it's under
warranty for six warranty. Warranties are nice kind of like
a used car or something.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Oh, dear, dear, And you know, is that like when
you go through metal detectors.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Is that going to be a thing as well?
Speaker 3 (16:27):
Yes, they said, don't go through metal detectors, like you
have to request like a pat down. I don't know,
like if there's like if you do, just make sure.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
You don't linger run through, except don't run right right.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
Yeah, we'll get to that, but yeah, yeah, yeah, like yes,
but I think in general, my policy instead of being like,
oh I can go through, but I can go fast,
it's just gonna be like, no, I have a thingy whatever,
pat me down, it's fine, and then saying yeah, like
the airport and concerts and stuff like that. And there's
some other really random stuff like they say like don't
use like a body fat scale, like you know those
are everywhere, yeah, and like we have one, and I'm like,
(17:00):
oh my god, don't.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Step on that, like don't forget.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
Yeah, yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (17:03):
Mean again, I think a lot of these things are
probably like not super high risk. But at the same time,
I'm like, if I accidentally shock myself, I'll.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Be really sad. Yeah, so yeah, you gonna.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
Try to be follow all the directions, try to avoid
that if at all possible. So you're resting, relaxing as
much as as possible in your life right here.
Speaker 3 (17:23):
Yeah, I'm still like tired, Like I'm still I'm honestly
still like in post up pain.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
To some extent.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
Today has been okay, Like I haven't even taken anything
other than I yourprofene like a few hours ago, and
I'm feeling pretty good. But I had to take like
a long nap this morning because I slept so badly
because of pain. So just not like back yet. My
thought is I'll probably have two weeks away from clinical
work from the date of the surgery, which I think
should be enough because it's not super super invasive, and
(17:49):
I'm my hope is to go back feeling like pretty
good rather than like limping on in there and kind
of being halfway there. So yeah, but podcasting, I mean, listen,
it's talking.
Speaker 1 (18:00):
I love to talk.
Speaker 3 (18:00):
It's like therapeutic. It away, so that kind of work.
I don't mind.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
Going back, don't mind going back to that's good. So yeah, yeah,
now I'm excited to be here. I'm getting to see
Sarah's house and experience the places that I've I've actually
only seen through like the zoom camera because I hadn't
been here before.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
You know, it's funny because I've been to your house
a bunch, so this is actually kind of cool.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Yeah, Well, Sarah's parents live pretty near to me, so
she has many reasons to come up and visit. But
I'm sure it's still like a huge adjustment and it's
your family been all doing okay.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
Yeah, they're doing okay.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
I mean we did a lot of frequent like text
chain updates and stuff like that. Josh kind of took
over a lot of that. But yeah, everyone seems okay.
I had the shower of love I got from like friends, family,
community members, blog readers, et cetera. Has been like totally
amazing and unexpected and not even like I just feel
bad like people are sending me on I'm like, you
don't need to do this, like thank you.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
No, It's been wonderful.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
It makes me just recognize, like what a wonderful community
has been built out of doing stuff out there in
the world, and I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:09):
Well, and we'll talk about this a little bit in
the question section of this. But you know, there's this
tension between planning and like life happens, of course, and
you can't plan for big things, unexpected things to happen.
But on the other hand, that doesn't mean that planning
(19:30):
is useless and not worth it either. And so I
feel like sometimes when big things happen, people come at
this it's like we'll see you know, you we make
our plans and God laughs. But no, because then just
even stuff like making sure like your daughter still got
her braces off at the right time, like a big
milestone for that, even in the middle of all this,
(19:52):
like all the good systems make that happen.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
Yeah, I definitely do not regret any of the past
planning I've done, nor do I like feel like, oh, well,
that was dumb. I wanted to you know, just because
my twenty twenty five goals had running related goals on
them make all of them worthless. I mean, first of all,
I always go in knowing I'm not going to meet
every goal, like maybe Laura.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
Doesn't, but I don't.
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Ever.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
I don't meet every goal. No, No, I know that.
Speaker 3 (20:17):
I definitely I think you sometimes aim more to meet
every goal. But I have like an open mind about like,
you know, this is what I'm thinking about, and if
I meet like a good amount of these, like, that's amazing.
But you wouldn't be here right now. We wouldn't actually
be having this time if we hadn't plan on it.
And even though it looks different, I'm still really really
glad like we planned it. Yeah, it's working out nice,
and it turns out that actually I'm getting some really
nice distraction.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Even then we would have been.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
At the beach, So that's all right. Planning can pause
and you could take time to wallow. I have a
whole chapter about like I'm gonna read my own chapter.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
Chapter you reach your own chapter on wallowings.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
No, but really I have a chapter on like when
things are hard, and like I talk about wallowing, and
I talk about like taking a minute to just like
regroup and letting yourself go slowly and all those kinds
of things, and those all apply, and you can still
plan and use planning to help you kind of recover
from something like this rather than be mad at the
fact that you did it in the first place.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
Yeah, well, we're going to take one more quick ad
break and then we'll be back with a little bit
more about this topic. Well, we are back talking about
life updates, Sarah, you know, adjusting to the new normal
(21:32):
with being a I don't know, being a cardiac patient,
being a cardiac patient. But you know, it's like we
could hold two thoughts in mind simultaneously, Hairy. One is that,
you know, we're all so grateful that things did not
go worse, that you got medical help quickly, that people
(21:53):
recognized what was going on, you were in a place
where that could happen, as opposed to like ten miles
from the house on a long on at four am
that you were doing on your own, where nobody would
have noticed or something until all that, So we could
be grateful for that. We can also just realize, like
everything about this sucks, Like there's just you know, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
And it's hard, like you know, there's no like suck Olympics.
Speaker 3 (22:16):
Like part of me is like, well I wish it
was this condition, are like, well that's worse than it's like,
you know what, that all sucks it all sucks, all
of it, and there's no like even real like comparisons
to be made or anything. And one piece of the
suckage that Laura hasn't mentioned because I thinks she's not
sure whether she should mention or not, is that I
probably cannot run anymore. Don't know for sure, but if
(22:38):
the diagnosis is what they think it is, exercise has
been shown to cause further remodeling of the heart in
a maladaptive way and can lead to heart failure over time.
Now I don't again, don't know for sure, so maybe
like there's like this chance they'll be like, actually it
was my ocarditis and that doesn't apply to you, and
like whatever. I don't think it's healthy for me to
hold on to that hope because I don't think it's
(22:58):
super high. But I'm just you know, I'll keep an
air of uncertainty there because it is there. But if
it is that, and certainly until we figure out that
it's not that, I can't really run, like won't be
able to do even like high intensity spinning. And before
you're like that can't possibly be true. I mean, of
course we don't know everything, but it looks like there
is enough research on this specific thing where the top
(23:20):
centers kind of really recommend very specific amounts of exercise
that are not what I was used to doing anywhere
close would I be able to maybe sometimes do a
slow three mile run, like maybe great, But it's going
to be a change.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
It's going to be a an enormous change.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
So I am grappling with that because it is nowhere
near it's important as being alive and being with my family,
and it's still like an annoying, crappy loss that is
going to change my lifestyle a lot, because I just
really have always loved to be active, Like I never
really had a long period of my life where I
wasn't working out most days for a significant amount of time,
(23:59):
and I feel like I was like really relied on
that like hormonal endorphin kind of whatever it was.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
It's not.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
It hasn't always been running, and there have been periods
where I've done a lot lot less. Like actually, I
look back on my infertility period when I was mostly
going to yoga, and I was like, you know what,
other than the infertility part, I kind of liked that lifestyle,
Like it wasn't that bad. So I'm glad I actually
have that to refer to and think about.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
So you've been through this before in the sense of
remodeling sort of your identity differents like I canun.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
Yeah, I can like feel active and enjoy life and
didn't really have like some huge gap in my my
existence when I wasn't running during that time. So, and
I didn't run that much when my kids were little either,
So I'm actually really glad that I've had breaks in
my life at the same time in the last two
years or so, it's been a huge source of joy.
(24:49):
And you know, I always wanted to be Q which
is Boston qualify, and then I finally did. And now
even if my time from Jacksonville Marathon in December makes it,
I like, I'm not going to submit it because I'm
not gonna be able to run the race.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
And that's that sucks that you qualified?
Speaker 2 (25:04):
You qualified? Yeah, yeah, you know, no, it's rough. Well,
we need to find you a new nine to ten
hour a week hobby. I guess I know what could
it be.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
I don't know. Maybe I'll write some more, write more books.
I don't know. You can sing, I don't know, choir.
Maybe I'll just sleep a lot more.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
Yeah, you don't have to get up at four fifteen
in the morning. That whatever hobby you're doing that may
not have to happen. Then maybe you know, play musical instruments.
You want to get violin back out.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Probably not probably not, okay, piano, maybe maybe piano. I
mean a few of those hours could be filled up
with like yoga, Yeah, yoga, that's true.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
We're gonna try some pilates, you know, all that kind
of stuff. Maybe more socials. I don't know, we'll see.
I'm not signing the hours yet, but it is a
fun thing to think about. Yeah, it's a positive.
Speaker 1 (25:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
Well, and again it's the holding two thoughts in mind
at the same point that you maybe things will be different.
I mean, medicine advances at a crazy rate. There will
be you know, you talk about making the appointment for
your surgery in twenty thirty three, but I can tell
you the device world will be different in twenty thirty
three than it.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
Maybe you could just like shoot it in there.
Speaker 2 (26:11):
I know it'll be like AI powered entirely and like
a robot that like does I don't know. And then
you know, gene therapy if it is genetic, like there's
all sorts of things that will happen in the next
eight years that we just have no idea, and that's
one of the most exciting things. But you can have
that thought, but then also build your life in a
way where you can be happy now whatever that takes.
Speaker 3 (26:35):
Yeah, and I believe I'm I don't have a doubt
that I could be happy again, like I think I
might if I hadn't done it before.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
But I have done it before, so I could do
it again. You can do it again. Well, that's wonderful. Well,
I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
I'm glad that we are still able to be in
the closet recording that there is a March eighteenth episode
or whatever date this is of.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
And by the way, if you're listening to this and
you're like, I don't think she's even fully processed this,
you're absolutely right. We are now like ten days or
so out from the event, so I'm still just like
what happened, Like, Yeah, there's lots of pieces of me
that are still just trying to figure out how I feel.
Speaker 1 (27:12):
And that's okay. I'm going to give myself time for that.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
I think there's a time and a place for therapy
and I think this is it, and yeah, just well
be going forward from.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Here, going forward from here. I love it.
Speaker 2 (27:24):
Well, our question for the week is actually related to this,
and I'll read it and then we can have Sarah's advice.
And this is just sort of like maybe how she's
giving her own advice to a degree. But this listener
writes in that she has a broken kneecap, can't walk
without crutches, this is an accident that happened, can't drive.
It's been really challenging to leave her house. They're up
(27:47):
a lot of steps. So basically she is going to
be staying home except for medical appointments, for the next
several months. Fortunately, her job has been able to convert
to be a one hundred percent work from home job,
which is very unfortunate. She's adjusting reasonably well to that situation,
she says, but most of her hopes and dreams for
(28:07):
other aspects of her life in twenty twenty five seem
to be lost. They were going to be taking a
European vacation as a family this summer, but it's hard
to know. Will she be able to walk around on
cobblestone types treats, you know, the various fitness goals, she had,
self care goals, friendship goals all seem out of reach.
She's still feeling kind of emotionally down about this whole thing.
(28:30):
It is grateful for advice on how to pull off
a major pivot when the things.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
You planned for the years seem like they might not
be happening. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
Well, there's a book coming out in January with a
whole chapter about this, and I definitely recommend that you
like pre order about ten copies because I'm just going.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
To give it to all your friends. I hear it's
called Best Slide Plans.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
Yes, So I mean yes, I one hundred percent like
I'm in the same place. And after the quote wallowing,
which I think can actually be helpful, just kind of
let yourself like not worry.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
About anything for a while, Like don't even.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Try to plan when you're just first contending with something,
but just like rest and watch TV and like soak
it in and like take a little bit of time
to process. And then once you've done that, I really
what I'm trying to do and what I have recommended
is to just like try to go short term first,
like not oh my god, I have to plan August
right now, and like will I be able to walk?
(29:19):
And like won't I be able to walk?
Speaker 1 (29:20):
And what can I do?
Speaker 3 (29:20):
But like, okay, what can I do this week? Like
what can I do tomorrow? What little joys can I
still fit into my life? How can I practice self
care tomorrow in the ways that I can, rather than
thinking too much about putting big goals or even like
pie in the sky ways of caring for myself like
for the long term. So I would focus yourself in
(29:42):
and then my other thing is to like get all
the support you can, like, don't feel bad. I noticed
there was like a little hinte of like, you know,
I did this to myself, but like you know, no
one wants to do that to themselves, So that needs
to just go. And I would lean on people who
want to help you, because they probably truly do want
to help you. And whether that is the support of
of paid caregivers or therapists or whatever, or just like
(30:03):
having your family help you a little bit more, you
should definitely accept that to the extent that you are
able to.
Speaker 1 (30:10):
Yeah, good advice. That's where I am right now.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Yeah, yeah, well, and just I mean figuring out what
you can still do. I mean, and if it doesn't
happen to go to Europe this summer, you know that
that's something that you want to do as a family.
That's why you planned it for the summer, which means
that if it doesn't happen this summer, you make it
happen next summer, right, and by that time things will
probably look entirely different in terms of your recovery. You
(30:34):
said that you had friendship goals. I bet you can
still come up with fun things to do with friends
because people will come visit you.
Speaker 1 (30:40):
You have a very good excuse to not go to them.
You can make them all come to you.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
They can bring wine and snacks or board games or
whatever it is that you can all crouche together, who
knows whatever you like to do, right, You can do
that and figure out new physical goals that still work,
and as you're recovering from this knee injury, that it's
gonna look different than if you didn't have that. But
that doesn't mean you can't have anything that you are
(31:06):
aiming for and then just keep revisiting as things go along.
So yeah, but definitely nothing gained by like beating yourself
up about any of this.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
I mean, people do not cause their medical things like this.
I mean, you know, anyway, we won't go on that soapbox.
All right, Well, hopefully this has been something of a positive. Yes, yeah,
I know it's a little less raw than the one.
We're all we're all feeling a little yikes, yeah, a
(31:37):
little bit yikes.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
I'd have recorded an episode of Bestlay of Plans like
from the Hot partly because like it's probably dumb, but
I was like, well, I have an episode due and whatever.
I probably could have just done something else, but I
maybe I also wanted to like share the story, like, yeah,
a process. So this one's a little more calm because
I'm a whole like ten days out now, the.
Speaker 2 (31:53):
Whole ten days out and in your closet and not
in the hospitals. So it's all feeling a little different,
all right, So.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
Love of the weeks, Sarah. Yeah, shout out to the
super nice nurses I had.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
I mean they were all good, but like there were
just some total standouts.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
One of them her name was Sarah. She was awesome.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
She was telling me all about like COVID times and
how that's what was her very first job was working
in the ICUs during COVID and I can't even imagine,
but like, yeah, the nurses were just they made the
experience great.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
Like the way they were like really made a difference.
So that was great. And then my other I'm giving
two because whatever, we can have two loves of the week.
This Why is that.
Speaker 3 (32:27):
Anvil's teeth are so straight? They're so pretty, Like I'm jealous.
She wore racist for a long time, and I you know,
I helped pay for them, so I feel like I
can take a little bit of credit. Oh and I
drove her to a lot of appointments.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
Yeah. Yeah, it's like your street teeth too. Yeah, if
they're in somebody else's mouth exactly. I'm going to say that.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
It's only a two hour and fifteen minute in the
air flight from Philadelphia to Fort Lauderdale, So you know,
I was in my house this morning and I'm in
Sarah's closet right now, and it's kind of cool how
that works. And yeah, I mean, air travel is amazing
and gets you far distances very very quickly, and that's
good because we can come see each other.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Yeah phl fll. It's done it many times, done it
many times.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
All right, Well we will be back next week with
more on making work and life fit together.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Thanks for listening.
Speaker 3 (33:16):
You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com
or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Can find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This
has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join
us next time for more on making work and life
work together.
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