Week 2 update

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3 weeks for me. Still in the hospital due to a Chylous leak. Was on TPN for 14 days and I am finally eating real food to test things out. Hopefully, the leak will be resolved and I could finally go home!!! Otherwise, I feel great!
 
Anthony - I have some similarities to you after reading your blog. My HR has dropped quite a bit. I was about 95 bpm right after the surgery while in the hospital; it then dropped to the 70's once I went on Metoprolol. And I am now down to a resting HR of around 58-60bpm. The drugs mask what your true HR might be in some ways. I'll be on Coversyl for 3 months (ACE Inhibitor) and Metoprolol for about 6 months. I'll be very interested to see what the HR does after this. Hopefully it stays down. My BP is also low like yours - that is to be expected with the drugs. Be careful if you are squatting down and get up too quickly - I have had brutal head rushes. I had 2 instances where it happened to me in a store and I almost fell over. I was told to get up slowly in stages/steps.

Wait until you hit around 2 months though (I am now at 10 weeks). If its anything like what I have experienced, you will hopefully feel phenomenally better. I found I really turned a corner at 2 months. I am working out almost as hard as I did before surgery and have had my heart up to as high as 160 bpm with no issue (I have typically stayed in a range of 130-150 bpm for 45 min - 1 hour - for now). The people that run the rehab at the hospital said I was doing extremely well. Once you are ready to start your rehab (probably in 4-6 weeks I would assume), get a stress test done. That will really give you a good idea of how you're doing and they should hopefully prescribe a training program for you with target HR zones and times. I started at 130-140 bpm for 15-30 minutes every other day and then increased it slowly from there). In the meantime, walk, walk, walk! :)

Hope your recovery continues to go well,

Tony
 
Tony,
Thanks for the reply! Your comments just got me really excited. Some stuff to look forward to. Thanks a bunch. Now if only this 3am pain will go away. It is guaranteed that I'll wake up around 3am with the worst of my pain, lately it has been back pain. I'm forced to stay up for a few hours, possibly take a painkiller, and maybe fall back asleep from 6-9.
 
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