People say you shouldn't keep secrets from family and doctors. I agree with the latter but I'm not really sure about the first. I never call my family or anyone in fact, but I do attend their calls. My friends who are reading this, if you observe carefully, you will notice that I only called you once or twice in the last few years. I hide a lot of things from a lot of people just to not throw anyone into panic mode. I did the same this time as well. I didn't tell my mom what exactly was happening, but I did tell her some truth. She wondered why I called her and asked her about my previous heart reports.I told her that I caught cold and I went to see a doctor who then examined me and asked about the previous reports because he heard a heart murmur. She asked me if I was fine and I said "Yeah, it's just a little cold". You know when people say "Smile through the pain", figuratively it is motivating, yes, but literally it's on a whole other level. I couldn't even talk properly through the pain. Every breath was feeling like a knife stab when I tried to breathe normally because of the shortness of breath. After the call [ Inner feeling : a death defying stunt at that time 😓 ], She sent me those reports and I forwarded them to the doctor. Till this point, the doc was 80% sure that I had HCM. After I sent him my previous reports, the doctor was nowhere to be seen.
I haven't heard from him since. I tried getting in touch with him, but it was no use, all my calls went directly to voicemail. Of course, it was understandable that the main reason for that was COVID. The doctors were busy in the COVID ward. I was in a very desperate position of help. The pain was intensifying everyday. I wish I could've stayed at the hospital but I couldn't afford the charges, so I visited the emergency ward everyday for a week. The doctors couldn't understand the cause of pain. The blood tests were showing that the troponin levels increased from 20 of 24 in a day [troponin levels: damaged heart (4-10 normal range, 39 probable heart attack)]. They injected me with morphine to ease the pain and sent me home. It was the story for a week and I was getting worse day by day. Breathing in was so hard, I was having sleep apneas. I couldn't get a cardiologist appointment. I needed someone, someone that I could rely on, someone that I truly believed would keep aside everything if I needed them, so out of desperation, I told a couple of friends what I was going through and asked them for help.
[ NOTE: I WILL NOT BE DISCLOSING NAMES OF MY FRIENDS (NOW OR FURTHER) FOR PRIVACY CONCERNS ]
Both of them were seven seas away and timezones apart. One of them contacted the Indian embassy in Australia for me and asked for help. The consulate reached out to me on the next day and asked me what was wrong, My exact words were "I don't know. I can't talk, can't breathe, can't eat, can't move properly, can't sit/stand in one position for more than 2min. I've been trying to get a cardiologist's appointment but I'm not able to find any. PLEASE HELP ME! 😣". She was kind enough to listen everything and told me that she won't be able to help me find a doctor immediately but, she suggested me to find a private clinic even if it's not covered in my health insurance. I couldn't travel for longer periods of time [ more than 20min 🤦🏻♂️ ] so I called up a small cardiologist clinic close to me and booked an appointment for initial consultation [ Inner voice: ** Initial consultation is better than no consultation at all 🥲 ** ]. I did wait for a couple of days for the confirmation of the appointment. Then I received a mail that says "Dr. Jeffery Franco will see you on the 10th Dec 2020". I knew the private clinic was going to cost me more than I could afford, but I didn't really have a choice. I had enough in my credit card.... or did I? 🙂