Thankfulness

Today, we're going to the memorial service for Baby Samuel. The family has been a wonderful testimony and yesterday's post, Life and Love, was no exception...worth a read. It is a constant reminder to me that everyday with my family is precious. Every exchange is to be cherished, not wasted. It's a moment to look at each other like it was your last time.


This is a comment posted on my blog some time ago and I've saved it. I read it every now and then and I will share it with you.
Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "This Will Make You Smile":

I'm a quilter too. I really love it and like you I exerience health scary situations. I never had a heart attack but I just started whithering away and it became hard to breath. I had a lung infection and now I have to wear oxygen so it's hard to me to jump in the car and get fabric or things I need from the store like I used to. No more surprise quilts for my family members because they have to accompany me to the store if I have the energy to go. Life's been hard since my illness. Count your blessings that you can, do all the things you do and can make a full recovery.

The last few lines ring so true for me....today is a blessing, treat like it's your last.

Enjoy,
Lindsey

Heart Disease / Obesity

In a recent issue of Quilter's World magazine, I noticed an insert for women's clothing. It was several pages long and an odd size page from the rest of the magazine....sooo.....I took a peak. I quickly realized it was a larger lady "ish" sort of catalog. I was shocked. Sizes starting at 12W to 44W. I'm not even sure what the "W" stands for.

Are we, quilters, branded as having a certain body type?

It made me realized that possibly we are spending too much time in front of our sewing machines and not enough time "beating the streets" with our "feets". Major industries have marketing departments that know this and focus their marketing accordingly.

Because heart disease is near and dear to my heart, and obesity it somehow linked to the quilting industry, I'm going do a few educational posts regarding eating, exercise and general heart disease knowledge. I learn so much from all of you who are so accomplished in the quilting world, now it's my turn to give back.

I realize this may not be what many of you want to hear but if we take care of ourselves we'll be around for those who love us. We are a great "blogland" community, full of support and friendships galore. I hope we can support each other to be healthy.

I hope you will take the time to read these posts as it can only help us in our fight against aging and poor health. I'll try not to hit you over the head with it but truly mean it for support purposes.

My Goal....that I'll never see another "catalog" in my quilting magazine. Those companies will want to run from OUR industry!

Don't worry, I won't stop blogging about "Jane" or any of my other quilting adventures...I'll just throw the heart stuff in there every now and then.

And....(we all raise our glasses) "Here's to having a Healthy Heart" !!!!!!!!

Heart Quilts

Goodness gracious....isn't this beautiful, happy, upbeat, and encouraging! Honestly, it just makes me want a hand dyed stash! Melody at Fibermania does such nice work, this is one of her beauties. She's a master at the creative process...everything is an original and her color is smack on every time....I'm pretty sure she hand dyes a good bit of her fabrics...she also has great tutorials on how to do everything from beginning to end, dying, piecing, fusing etc. I see a little Kaffe in here which is unlike a majority of her quilts...I like it though.

Want to see more Heart Quilts...click here. There's a whole slew of them...like hundreds!
Enjoy!

Great News

The results of my Nuclear Stress Test were as good as it gets.
My heart pumped 75 % of the blood in my body which is the maximum a heart can pump at one time.
Maximum heart beat: 184 beats per minute; wow. At 45 years old, they only wanted it to go as high as 175. I'll admit...I was surprised at how long I could run up hill with 3 people watching my every move.

Hey, you guys, thanks for the blog land support...As I was running on the treadmill, with a radiologist injecting my veins with nuclear material...I was thinking about how nice it was to share this experience with folks who really care...that's you. It truly took the "bite" out of the whole scary experience.....and so I say.....thank you.

"you"....are....all about my heart.

Tea at the Ritz - Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissection - Lipoprotein a

(See that little pale spot in the top artery...that's the "Squeeze - or Pinch")

Kind of a crazy long complicated name. The easiest way to explain it is to say an artery is like a straw being "pinched" and it's even harder to get your milkshake through the straw than it was before...This is my problem. The "lipoprotein a" is a marker for heart disease, and it may cause those arteries to collapse, pinch, squeeze or whatever they do.

Here's the scoop: I had chest pain last Tuesday and after a couple of minutes I got it stopped with Nitroglycerin and a chewed up aspirin....appetizing, I know....reminds me of tea at the Ritz.


This landed me at the doc's office on Wednesday and a Nuclear Stress Test on Friday. Just call me Cher (didn't she do a movie that had radiation type stuff in it? or was that Erin Brockovich? - tall and thin....it's all the same).

I think it all went really well and I couldn't feel better.

Oddly enough, my older brother (he's the oldest of our 5 siblings and I'm the youngest - 15 years older) is doing the same thing, with the same doctor, this same week....can you say GENETIC? I love (lol) this article....the first line is: "Spontaneous coronary artery dissection is a rare and generally fatal disease." So encouraging right off the bat...it's actually a very good article and the patient they followed is almost my same story, Life Flight (part 3).

Here's the funny part of all of this...My boyfriend in college is now a CARDIOLOGIST of all things ...in Atlanta. He's the one that made the original diagnosis (no, I didn't go see him) and my doc confirmed it as correct.
(Heavy sigh)...old boyfriends are the reason I don't do Facebook! In all seriousness, it was nice for My Hero and I to talk to someone who could put it all into everyday language.

God has a huge wonderful plan for me and so far it's been scary and wonderful at the same time. A gift and a growing experience. Not always secure with what tomorrow brings but peaceful nonetheless. It's just nice to know where I'm going when the time comes. :)

What Inspires You?

What inspires you to create, ...to love,... to seek,.... to press on? Gosh, maybe you say to yourself...I'm not really inspired to do those things, it's life and it just happens to me. Whether you are intentional about these things or not, everyone desires to be inspired, moved, taken to the extreme of something wonderful.

What brings you to tears? Only the sad? or the beautiful as well. As a 8 or 9 year old, I watched my grandfather weep in church while singing "The Old Rugged Cross". Without truly understanding his emotions, I still knew it was something wonderful. To this day, My Hero carries a handkerchief for me on Sundays. I don't make it through a service without tearing up during the music.
Genetics? Maybe. All I know is that for a split second, a nano second, I get it. I get the preciousness of it all.

What inspires me? a sunrise over the ocean? birth? a victory? Yeh, yeh. Look a little deeper. Do you know someone who truly listens? or do you go through life making small talk... getting through one event or another? Are you truly a friend who cares? Or are you just checking off the "friend requirement" boxes of life?

Inspiration comes to me in several forms. Old hymns, holding a hand while walking the block, watching my daughter dance The Nutcracker, hearing My Hero's story of watching me being Life Flighted at 2:30 a.m., him texting a friend at the same time.... and getting a text back, a friend having the courage to jump in bed with me during recovery, watching a parent hold to their standards - no matter what, seeing my son surpass his athletic ability in order to win,

a recent inspiration:...a homeless child running down the hall at "The Shelter" to show me his report card.

Sincerity, being real, ...it's inspirational.

What inspires your heart?

Life Flight - Part 3 - The Gift

This is 3 weeks after "My James Bond moment" (the helicopter ride) - I used it as my Christmas card this year, ...no matching clothes, no fancy poses, just happy to be together.

Here's the end of the story:

Remember that neck pain I was telling you about? Well, it popped up on me while at the beach in June 2008 (6 months ago), just 3 weeks after my mother passed away. It scared me that I may be having another heart attack. My tests came back abnormal and I had a heart catherization. Nothing showed up, still in pain, we started on the 6 hour drive home.

In the car, 5 hours into the trip, I felt that artery (in the groin) burst open internally. It felt like something (blood) running loose around your body...very strange. It's odd how you know when something is really wrong and this time I knew something was really wrong.

I slumped over in my seat, blood was no longer feeding my organs. My Hero is driving like a maniac trying to get me to a hospital. Feeling all the strength leave me, knowing soon I would not be able to speak, .......I said good-bye to my family. Hardest thing I've ever had to do.

"I don't think I'm going to make it, keep your eyes on Christ, I love all of you so much, I will be in heaven, Daddy will take good care of you"...and that was all I could get out.

Everyone is crying and my middle child, normally quiet, reserved, composed, was yelling, "No Mom, no..hold on, don't die". At that point, I wanted so badly to reassure her but I couldn't talk and I looked like a rag doll, slumped head over knees in the car seat. The vascular pain had kicked in at this point and I knew this was the end of me.

I got to a small hospital where they gave me the maximum amount of morphine allowed but it didn't affect the pain. In my mind, body in convulsions, I cried out to God, to my mother and that's when I went into shock. What a blessing. Honestly, I was thinking about soldiers and how they bleed to death in this same way.

It's midnight at this point, I'll let you imagine the scene of My Hero and children in the waiting room.

After 2 hours of not being able to stabilize me, they life flighted me to a larger hospital. A sweet, 75 year old Greek vascular surgeon, at 3:00 a.m. hastily cut me open, repaired the artery and told my husband, "She had 10-20 minutes left". 12 units of blood later, I'm here. You only have 8 units to begin with. Just for the record...my nurse told me that only 1 out of 6 life flighters make it. Lovely.

Now about that gift: the inherited heart problems from my father, the LP (a). It has changed my perspective. I've come close twice. So why is it a gift...because now, I look for the sweetness in life, I cherish every exchange with those I love most. Every walk around the block holding a hand is precious, every sunrise is breathtaking, every book read to my Baby Girl could be my last, it all becomes a matter or perspective, I cherish it all, good and bad. It's a gift.


In the end, He doesn't make mistakes, He works all things for good. He, God is, ....all about shaping my heart.

Life Flight - Part 2, Praying for a SIster

My Nutcracker daughter began praying for a baby sister when she was 3 years old. Every night she prayed the same prayer. "Lord, please bless our family with a baby". She meant it. It was earnest. Just like the Persistent Widow. Little did she know, My Hero and I had already been "trying" since the Nutcracker was born. Well...



We gave up after 5 years. We wondered if we should tell her to stop praying. We stopped praying for a baby but she did not. We gave up on God and surrendered to "His Will". "Should we tell her to stop praying...it's just not happening and that's OK. "

Oh to have the faith of a child. We came to her 6 months later and told her that God had answered her prayer...we would have a baby.

9 months later - my due date arrives and passes - nothing going on in the dilation department. However, in the middle of the night, I began vomiting uncontrollably. Not sick. Not nauseated. Just vomiting. Fast forward to the hospital...still vomiting hours later...docs can't figure it out. My heart beat starts dropping to the low 30's. Doc says,

"We're losing Mama"

A quick c-section later: a beautiful baby girl



I came out of recovery with unbearable neck pain. (keep that in mind for Part 3). An undiagnosed heart attack, atypical signs (vomiting and neck pain) more common in child birth than you think.

10 days later - I experienced a full blown heart attack. Awoken from an afternoon nap while holding my newborn, crushing chest pain and no breath. I prayed, "Please Lord, let this be my last breath". I was drowning. I wanted to go ahead...it was really Ok with me.

My son, 9 years old at the time, made Baby Girl a bottle and changed her diaper, all while watching me about to...

Things subsided and I called 911.

911 guys arrived...get this...I offered them ice tea (manners are everything, aren't they). Not really in the moment, was I.

2 stents later, and this diagnosis: Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissection (say that 10 times fast)

I'm here. They're here.



It's all about..."repairing" the heart.

Life Flight - Part 1, Lipoprotein (a)

What is Lipoprotein (a)? Your guess is as good as mine. My doc calls it "LP little a". It's a marker for heart disease. Are you bored with this post already? They really don't know what it does or what affects it but they know that if your number is high, you're in trouble...

my number is high...real high.

In my case, they think it weakens the walls of my arteries and they collapse. I'm not a clogged up girl but my walls are weak and they fall. When they fall, I do the heart attack thing. Here's the story:


That much beloved photo above, is my dad and me (that's correct English, btw) at Georgia Tech homecoming in fall of 1968. He was 45 and I was 4. He died of his third heart attack within the year at a train station in Leningrad, Russia. He was taking a group of students to Russia...they were some of the first Americans allowed in that country during the Cold War. I'm the youngest of 5 children.
Digest that for awhile.

I know this sounds a little grim so far but truly....the Lp (a), is such a gift. I'm not just being Polly Anna meets Holly Golightly. You'll see, in part 3...it's all about the heart.

Life Flight Recipes: How to Rescue a Friend in Need

Here is the rescuee...me. It's a long story and I promise I will get to it. In the meantime bear with me. I'll get it out before you can get to a new year! I hope...not very good at deadlines, you know.

Here's my clan. It was taken in Montreat, NC, one of our favorite spots on earth. I'm feeling like Cindy Crawford at this point because I don't think I had anything to eat for a week except an IV. However disappointed I was at the "hippage" on the right, I can assure you it was only due to the distortion caused by my sitting on that large rock. Just when you think you've got a decent picture for the Christmas card. Humbling...


Wednesday is the big day for unveiling the "Life Flight Recipes: How to Rescue a Friend In Need" cook book. It is a collection of all the recipes (or rather the ones I could gather) of friends, family, neighbors and even strangers who brought meals to my family this summer during my recovery. Can you imagine that kind of outpouring? It's overwhelming the love you feel when people give of themselves and make YOU a priority in their lives. It's an amazing thing to be on the receiving end. Now, I'm well past the road of recovery and getting stronger everyday. Wednesday is the open house when the girls will open be at my home to open their cookbooks. I have not seen many of them for months. Big hugs will abound, laughs and thanks will be the order of the day, and a great closing to a harrowing year will ensue. I look so forward to seeing my friends and giving them all a big spoonful of gratitude. For the complete story and the recipes....stay tuned. Hint...if you haven't guessed it yet...it involves a life flight helicopter ride. I will share it with you, laugh with you, cry with you and get in the pit with you. After all...it's all about the heart.