On April 21, 2023, we tested positive for COVID-19 while cruising to Southampton, England. A doctor came to our cabin and stood outside, dressed in protective gear from head to toe. The cruise was ending in two days, but we had to move to the “COVID deck,” where we were held captive, unable to leave the cabin. Guards observed the cabin doors to ensure no sick cruisers or family members left their cabins.

I was awake the previous night with no obvious COVID-19 symptoms, but my blood pressure was outrageously high (180/120), and my pulse was 185 the entire night. When Tom awoke, coughing and sneezing. Within an hour, we were both tested positive.

In the post from that day, April 21, 2022, I described my frightening heart symptoms, which I’d never had in the past, except for a few days while still in ICU after having open heart surgery in February 2019.

Here’s our post from the day we tested positive for Covid-19.

Months later, after most of our COVID-19 symptoms had faded, I was left with two lingering symptoms: pain in my left face and forehead (which started the day I was diagnosed) and ongoing on-and-off Afib and PVCs. Later, while we were living in Marloth Park, I visited Dr. Theo many times, trying a variety of drugs to help with the awful symptoms. Nothing worked.

Nonetheless, a full year later, I had an outrageous Afib bout whereby I ended up in the Nelspruit Hospital Medicclinic for three nights while they tried to figure out the source of the Afib. Still, after cardioversion (shocking the heart), the Afib improved. I left the hospital with a prescription for Flecainide to start taking if the symptoms returned.

A few days later, we flew away to The Villages, Florida, where we stayed for several months, awaiting another cruise. On the plane, I had another Afib and high blood pressure bout that lasted almost 12 hours during the 14-hour flight from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Orlando, Florida. It was awful.

During the months in Florida, the pain in my face and head continued, and the Afib reappeared many times. I practiced several breathing techniques that helped some people, but overall, I had no control over when suddenly the symptoms would appear.

I won’t repeat the story in detail of how, over the next year or so, I had three cardiac ultrasounds in three different countries by three cardiologists, all of which indicated I had severe heart valve failure. These mitral and tricuspid valves required immediate open-heart surgery.

After I had the third ultrasound in the US to confirm the past two diagnoses, I was again told that surgery was imminent or I could die from a massive coronary or stroke. I was told the valve problems were causing the Afib. That precipitated our decision to come to Cleveland Clinic, and here we are now.

For over a year, I had taken the dangerous(Black Box by FDA) antiarrhythmic drug Flecainide and, most recently, another perilous drug, only for three weeks, Multaq. To make an already very long story short, the drugs were making me deathly ill. I felt like my “number was up” and that I’d better focus on the quality of my life in the past and accept my fate.

Then, the electrophysiologist (cardiologist), Dr Keogh, here at Cleveland Clinic, had me get off all the drugs and see what happened. Gradually, over the past month, I had no Afib and only mild PVCs, which improved daily. The longer I was off the drugs, the fewer PVCs I had. By coincidence, the pain in my face and head is gone. The long COVID-19 symptoms have ended after 2½ years. 

I wore the heart rhythm-detecting Holter monitor for two weeks, and the doctor could see that my symptoms, which were so awful six weeks ago, had dropped to a surgery/procedure-free level. When he called me yesterday, he said, “Go on with your life and enjoy it to the fullest. You are good to go now! No drugs, no treatment, no procedures, and subsequently, no worry.

Oh my gosh, we both jumped for joy! In minutes, we were busy planning where we’d go as soon as we could pinpoint our next location before returning to Africa in March, a mere four months from now.

Tomorrow, we’ll share the lucky news of where we’ll spend these remaining months when the busy holiday season left us with few options.

See you tomorrow! Happy day!

Abstract from National Library of Medicine

See their post here.

Background

COVID-19 infections are known to cause numerous systemic complications, including cardiovascular disorders. In this regard, clinicians recently noticed that patients recovering from COVID-19 infections presented with a diverse set of cardiovascular disorders in addition to those admitted to the ICU (intensive care unit). COVID-19 heart has multifaceted presentation ranging from dysrhythmias, myocarditis, stroke, coronary artery disease, thromboembolism to heart failure. Atrial fibrillation is the most common cardiac arrhythmia among COVID-19 patients. In the background section, we briefly discussed the epidemiology and spectrum of cardiac arrhythmias in COVID-19 patients.”

Be well.

Photo from ten years ago today, November 2, 2014:

This bird hung out in a parking lot when we walked to a local beach. It’s a Cattle Egret. For more photos, please click here.