I'm a happy camper now

I’m prone to low blood pressure, heartbeat’s slow too. When you’re on the verge of fainting, getting down low, or prone, ASAP, both helps and can prevent injury from toppling.

A specialist said I’d likely need a pacemaker in about a decade. That was about 10 years back. I’d much rather not.

 

I'm not sure how much time you can count on—how long consciousness and voluntary motion persist—if the heart in fact stops. I think I read somewhere (not sure where, at the moment) that a person in ventricular fibrillation is inevitably unconscious, more or less immediately. It may be that the sensation of stoppage you've felt is something short of actual stoppage, so far anyway.

I've heard of people having sleep apnea, whose breathing stops for a spell while asleep, and SpO₂ drops, sometimes triggering changes in heart rhythm.

I think I would want an explanation for why SpO₂ was dropping like that while awake and alert. Could that suggest that something about breathing, or oxygen transfer in the lungs, isn't happening efficiently? Maybe the diagnosis of HF earlier is part of that story.

I don't even play a physician on TV. This may be worth getting an opinion from someone who knows the stuff.

 

+1

 

i'm not smart enough to self diagnose serious medical issues

 

For 20 years, I have been treated for sleep apnea. Early on, I used a recording, pulse oximeter to confirm the diagnosis. My initial symptom, a slight reduction in short term memory. My late wife was narcoleptic so it was easy to become a patient of her sleep doctor for a diagnosis and resolution.

I bought a Tesla and paid an extra $1,200 (back then) only to have it save me and my family a month later. We'd gone out of town and I left my sleep apnea, CPAP device, at home. Medical problem with my wife converted a planned 'weekend' into 10 days without treatment. I suffered five micro-sleep events returning home that she recognized and we didn't drive off the road into a power pole or roll the car.

A subtle disorder, sleep apnea, the effects can be quite deadly. Worse, difficult to identify although much easier to diagnose today.

Another "fainting" risk is hypoglycemia, low blood sugar. A Type-2 diabetic, I wear a Stelo, over-the-counter, continuous blood sugar sensor (replaced every 14 days.) With it I have tailored my diet and medications to achieve a more stable blood sugar level. This includes finding "secret sugars" in some fast foods. But about blood sugar:

• Too low - you can pass out and drive poorly
• Too high - I have to take a nap

Bob Wilson

 

From Google:
Critical thinking is defined as the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating information gathered from observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication. It involves questioning, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating information to make sound judgments. Additionally, critical thinking is the ability to effectively analyze information and form judgments while being aware of one's own biases.

Just like common sense, many claim but few actually display

 

i don't like when they get recalled

 

Would suggest talking to a medical professional & visiting online communities comprised of the many people who have been given a second lease on life with a pacemaker to get actual reliable real information.

Julie Bowen's Heart Journey: A Pacemaker and Life Lessons | US Newsper

Many people would be dead without a pacemaker intervention in their life and many more would be consigned to an earlier death and a greatly decreased quality of life without a pacemaker.

Pacemakers extend your life they have no negative effects on longevity
Life expectancy with a pacemaker: What to expect
"Research from the Mayo Clinic indicates that modern pacemakers don’t typically affect life expectancy."
Many young people live out normal lifespans after receiving a pacemaker.

The Life-Saving Evolution of Pacemaker Technology

How Pacemakers Are Revolutionizing Heart Care

Micra: The World’s Smallest Pacemaker | Stony Brook Heart Institute


Julie Bowen who is currently alive because of a pacemaker

 

Yes, because when it comes down to a choice of fainting while driving or having a pacemaker, the critical thinking solution is to choose fainting while driving so you can kill yourself and probably someone's family. At the age of 68, you're concerned a pacemaker is going to 'burn out' the existing nerve? THAT, my friends, is critical thinking!!

You are proving this to not be true:
Critical thinking has always worked for me,
where panic and hysteria have failed.

 

If a pacemaker can make me look like Julie Bowen I want one now.

 

Beautiful lady, accomplished award winning actress - she got her pacemaker at age 29 after experiencing increasing heart related problems that began during her time in college.
Many probably recognize her from the show Modern Family.

 

Not since sophmore year in college...

 

it's probably the pacer