Only time will tell

I've been back home resting since Thursday — so glad the doctors allowed me to return home for the weekend before  heading back on Sunday to get ready for my 3rd round of chemotherapy starting Monday. 

As mentioned in the previous post, I underwent cardiac ablation on Wednesday morning. It usually takes 1 hour, but for my case they took almost 3 hours. The cardiac doctors say my case is unique — those who have Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome usually have their extra electrical pathway on the left side of the heart; mine's on the right. And for these people, theirs will be found at the bottom; mine was found at the top area. Doctors wouldn't know exactly where the extra pathway is until during surgery, that's why my procedure took so long. My doctor said they had to "look high and low for it" haha. 

With local anesthetic, they inserted three ablation catheters through my groin area, and these are guided to my heart through the blood vessel. From the tip of these catheters, radio waves produce heat to destroy the heart tissue (i.e. my extra pathway). They also gave me sedation... twice. Sedation was meant to make me drowsy, but not enough to sleep. I felt that it didn't really work?! Thought I was awake 98% of the time. It was quite entertaining actually.

Surgeon: "Standby... eh standby, did you guys hear me? Can y'all focus please"

Surgeon: "30 watts... 35 watts... 40 watts... Hold. 20 seconds... Ok stop!"

When the electric current was introduced, thank god there wasn't any pain. But for 40 watts, there was a slight metallic taste in my mouth? Anyway towards the end, they gave me some drug that tingled my entire body and made my face flush. I was like, "What did you guys give me! Am I supposed to feel hot!!" 

And my doctor simply smiled and replied, "A sprinkle of magic dust".

Post-op, they took my ECG and it was, for the first time in my life, normal. No extra long lines means no more extra pathway! Woohooo success! Just had a pressure bandage wrapped around my groin and leg. 

BUT...  I was greeted with not-so-good news the next morning. ECG taken again showed that my irregular heart beats came back :'( My heart really sank. But Dr Eric remains hopeful... during the ablation, the amount of watts they applied were minimal — enough to scar the pathway, but I guess not enough to get rid of it entirely. Hopefully my heart will be smart and try to use the main pathway more since this extra one is slightly damaged, this way I think I'll have less palpitations/fast heart rates?

For now, it's a wait-and-see approach. We'll need to see how it reacts when the chemotherapy drugs are introduced next week. Gotta have faith!