Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Health fair adventure

I had an interesting adventure during a heart screening during a health fair at work today.

I had signed up for a cholesterol screening where you get the results back in 4 minutes. This was a test that you didn't have to fast for, just got a simple prick of the finger.

Sue gives blood all of the time at Bonfils, not sure how much she has given(some ridiculous amount, she even has a 5 gallon pin or something like that). They always give her a finger poke to make sure she isn't anemic so I thought this shouldn't be a big deal.

The technician started pricking my middle finger and then started complaining it was going to take too long to extract the blood and asked if she could poke my other finger. She poked my ring finger and for some reason I began to feel very hot and lightheaded. I put my head between my knees, I felt like I was going to faint. They wheeled me in a chair over to a couch that was in the room so I could lay down. My skin was clammy and my shirt was soaking wet at that point and this is a person that almost doesn't ever sweat even when I am running.

They hooked me up to a blood pressure monitor to check my pulse and blood pressure. My heart rate was down to 30 and my blood pressure was very low. They kept me on the couch for 30 minutes, got a cool washcloth to put on my forehead. She kept telling me to take deep breaths, breath in through your nose, exhale out through the mouth. Okay, this is just like being at Yoga, I can do that. I closed my eyes and practiced the Savasana pose which is always the final pose at every Yoga class I have ever been at. This time I was among my coworkers so it was a bit hard to achieve a state of deep relaxation.

Eventually my blood pressure returned to normal and my heart rate also normalized. I have no idea what caused this to happen.

After all that, I found that my cholesterol was better than it has been in years. They suggested I exercise at least 3 times a week for 30 minutes. That will help your numbers! I thought that was quite funny at that point.

I think I will skip the health fair next year.

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