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“Five more minutes” is what I kept telling myself as I lay in bed this morning, not wanting to face going to the doctor today. This last week has been filled with fear, as my blood pressure spiked to unprecedented levels, along with assorted aches and pains that had me worried even beyond the norm. And the worrying norm, for me, is pretty high in the best of times.
How bad did it get? I took my own blood pressure way more often than usual last week, simply hoping to see it go down. But when it went up every time, I stopped. I knew I was seeing the doctor today, so I didn’t need to aggravate myself any more. Oh, I was tempted. Maybe it did go down over the weekend. But what if it didn’t?
One of the oddest parts of this ordeal (to me, anyway) was that I felt okay as long as I was up and moving around and doing something. As soon as I sat down, the aches and pains started bothering me, which made me worry, which made them worse. I couldn’t even sit and watch the Giants win the World Series, so I listened to them on the radio and only looked up at the TV to see the big plays. While I listened, I probably got more work done than during an actual work day lately.
My doctor gave me a lot of hope that nothing is seriously wrong. He adjusted my blood pressure medication, but he’s not as worried as I was at the elevation. When he took it today, it wasn’t as high as it was when I took it last week. His analysis of my aches and pains, from the way I described them, is that they might be some kind of minor inflammation, certainly nothing cardiac-related. He was very unsympathetic with my sore knee that kept me from exercising; he wants me to start back on the program right away.
So tonight I feel a lot better than I did this morning. I always feel better after seeing the doctor. I guess that’s the way it’s supposed to be. |
