Workout #7

I was now entering 6 months since the heart attack, and about 7 1/2 months of weight loss.  By then I was pretty much entrenched in new eating  habits, enjoying healthier foods, and my family was believing in the new me.  They recognized I was intent on working to improve my health, strength, and doing whatever doctors thought was best for my heart health.   For my birthday, my daughter gave me a great gift, at the appropriate time for me.  Membership to a fitness center. Five minutes from my home.  Open 24/7.  Trainers, pools, spa, indoor track.  It was great.  I keep forgetting you don't know all of my health background so I need to let you know a few things that probably a lot of you can relate to. Especially those of you my age who have had heart attacks.   I was not an exercise, workout, play sports, ride a bike, take physical care of myself kind of a guy.  But I had been doing my walking and was ready to step up to a real exercise routine.   Let me stop right here.The first step was to meet with my cardiologist and get approval.  Next my daughter arranged for me to have some beginner sessions with a trainer who worked with,  and had specific workout programs, for heart patients like me.  Michelle belonged to another fitness club,  had experience with this trainer and felt it was important I work with someone familiar with cardiac patients. So before beginning to work out on my own, I met with my cardiologist, and a trainer.  You may want to consider the same if you are a beginner.  My trainer gave me an orientation of the center, strength machines, treadmills, kind of how everything works.   My first day was pretty much intimidating, like the new kid in school.  A good mix of men and women, all age ranges, more young than older, and almost all in good physical shape.  In other words I saw I had a long ways to go.  Cindy decided she would  join and start working out with me.  Cindy worked with a trainer and got on a routine for herself.  She was like me, no experience doing this stuff.  Cindy was in good physical condition. She was never sickly, didn't have time to.  She had been too busy raising our three children while I was off running a business. I was gone a lot, eating out two or three nights a week. She was unlike me,  always ate the right foods, took care of herself.  Never complained once about my bad health habits.

Treadmill, 2 miles at 3.4 mph.  1 mile around the track at quick walking pace, carried a 5 pound weight in one hand above my head.  It helps circulation.   Let me be overly cautious here, you don't need to do anything I did unless you talk to your doctor first. That's what I did.....10 minutes on an elliptical machine.  Then I spent 30 minutes on some specific strength machines, trained on by my trainer, and approved by my cardiologist. A trainer can be expensive, and I was looking for a routine that would be good for me and my condition.  It took only  2 sessions with the trainer to get an established routine.  From then on I was on my own, which is what I preferred.  So I was exercising about 1 hour 30 minutes or so daily.  I worked out 6 days a week, for 1 year, then  I went to 5 days a week.  If on vacation I didn't skip working out.  I would find a way to do all or some of my daily routine. 

Cindy faltered, working out is just not her thing, she works out but I don't think she enjoys it as much as I do.  Kind of like  oatmeal, it's good for you, but you need to do it every day.
You know something else good I got from the fitness center.  Being around people. I really enjoy working out, my routine and feeling good after an hour and half of exercise.  It is a great place to people watch.   This was a large center and it wasn't unusual for 40-50 people to be working out around you.  A few older 60 plus, men and women. 45-60 more men than women. Most of the guys in this group are in pretty good shape, lifting weights, working on muscle building. Most of the ladies are a little bit on the heavy side. They do a lot of treadmill and track walking.  25- 45 year olds lots of young suburban moms in good physical shape, work out a lot on stairmasters, running on treadmills and stationary bicycles. Guys same as the gals.  18-25 year olds  spend most their time walking around center looking to see who's looking at them. 

I gave up working out on the elliptical.  I felt like I was pushing myself too far and my heart rate got too high for me while on that machine.  I wore a small heart rate monitor while working out to track my rate, and after several months eventually felt comfortable to stop using it.   I expanded my use of strength machine usage and increased my total bar-bell capacity from 5 to 70 pounds.  (10 months).
I use the treadmill for 6o minutes, no incline.  I have some good exercise people stories I can tell you if anyone wants to hear them.

My next posting I will spend a lot more time on blood pressure, more details on foods I eat, vitamins. In general some things I think I have neglected in telling you about myself.

Cindy Can You do The Leaves For Me? #6

 I'm not sure where to start -  exercising, diet, healthy foods.   First I think I need to finish up about weighing, tracking your weight loss and all of that.  You know I only can tell you  what worked for me and why.   Even though I was absolutely ready to change,  I knew losing weight was going to be a battle for me. I don't know the exact date but the night before I started,  I weighed myself.  Man was that depressing.  I thought maybe about 225 pounds. I weighed 240.   The next time I weighed was almost 6 weeks later to the day at the doctors office. My exam,  remember.  I thought if I could weigh 225 that would be great. 15 pounds lost in 6 weeks.  I weighed 218 and did that make me feel good, especially when the nurse began bragging about the weight loss to my doctor.  You can see I averaged about 3 pounds per week weight loss. Now seriously, I was starving, and if I had weighed after the first 14 days and seen I had lost only 5 pounds, I would have been ready to walk to Birmingham for another double cheeseburger.  So why find a reason to discourage yourself by jumping on the scales every day.   You're doing it for the long haul, changing eating habits, right.   How many times have you done what I use to do. Every few years going on a very rigid diet. Sacrifice eating, living on celery, carrots and other similar foods.  Somebody at work told you about their cousin losing 50 pounds on this very diet.   Weighing every day and hanging in there for 3 weeks to meet your 15 pound loss goal.  And when you hit it, what do you do ? You stay with it for a bit, and then you go right back to the same old appetite habits.  Same old ways.  I did.  A heart attack is the last thing on your mind, I know, remember me, their for someone else, it won't happen to me attitude. I don't think weighing yourself after the first day is very important. I didn't think I  needed to invest in some expensive diet program  you see on TV, or join some club where you weigh in front of everybody, and their snickering and thinking,  man that guy is wasting his time.

Get a few books, read up on nutrition, calories, get on the internet.  Most importantly talk to your doctor.  My cardiologist provided me with a lot of good  information on heart healthy foods, nutrition, and diets.  You'll figure out whats best for you.

It was now almost 5 months after my heart attack and I was walking 1 1/2 miles twice daily.  Once in the mornings and again afternoons.  It was the middle of January and the weather most days was not good for being outside, but I dedicated myself to walking every day.  I talked to my doctor about exercising, weight loss, and my heart condition.  My doctor felt good about the progress I had made and my heart was strong enough for me to start exercising my body.  But he cautioned no lifting over 5 pounds.  I said,  like one 5 pounder in each hand?  No, was the answer, 5 total pounds. Start small and work up.  He reminded me again, you're not as well yet as you think.  Your body will let you know what your limits are.  I had made a complete reversal.  Gone were the thoughts that I would always be sickly, no energy, unable to do the things I had always enjoyed.  I could start picking up my grandchildren again. I looked forward to doing yard work, picking up leaves.

Wait just a second, maybe if I work this right I could convince Cindy she needs to do the leaf  work or get me one of those cyclone rake leaf machines.  Yeah that's it. I'm getting back to normal.

This Is Depressing, Will I Get Back To Normal ? #5

The fluid issue was a build up around the lungs and heart which is  a complication of heart surgery. This fluid normally is absorbed before it accumulates and begins to surround your lungs. Early the following morning Cindy and I were at the hospital.   My heart surgeon had explained the  procedure to me,  he would not be doing it, someone else would.  I didn't ask if the other guy wears boots.  The procedure did not go well, was very painful. We left the hospital that night at 6:30 pm.  That was the beginning of  a 2  1/2 month medical odyssey. From early October and ending around Christmas.  I had 2 or 3 doctor appointments almost weekly, outpatient and  hospital stays. I was in the hospital a couple days for a nuclear stress test for my heart, being discharged a few days before Thanksgiving.  That is when I begin to  doubt if I would ever get back to my normal life.  There is not much to tell you other than I was not making good progress, just the opposite.   I finally told my cardiologist I could not go back for another lung treatment.  I didn't think I was strong enough to endure it. It was too painful and didn't seem to be working.  The following week I went for chest x-rays and after reviewing the images the technician ask if  one of my lungs had been removed. There was so much fluid around the lung, it would not show on the x-ray.  I continued the painful procedures until my lungs began to clear.  Cindy was there with me the whole way, she never faltered.  We became pretty well know by the staff around the hospital by being there so often. While all of that was going on my cardiologist had me drop out of an  exercise recuperation program for heart patients.  He felt I could continue my walking, but not a great distance. I  maintained a very short distance walking routine while my lungs were beginning to clear.

The first lung fluid removal  was exhausting and painful.  You're taken into a room with one doctor and two nurses, you're given a local anesthetic and the surgeon explains how he is going to drain the fluid.   This is not some tiny hypodermic needle, it's large and it goes in through your back to your lung area.  A lot of fluid is removed and as it goes down there is a change of pressure in your chest cavity, your lung expands somewhat, and that is when the pain starts.  I went to recovery, Cindy was with me,  and it was several hours before I felt well enough to be discharged and sent home.

My children were very supportive and encouraging to me through the time of my recuperation.  We always have a heavy fall leaf removal and clean up around our home. Michelle and her husband saw to it that was handled for us.  Ann, our other daughter spent time helping Cindy with things she had put aside to look after me.  My wife never complained about my circumstances and believe me I gave her plenty of  reasons to.   Brent our son and youngest child, took care of all of my fall deer hunting responsibilities and anything Cindy needed him to do for us. Our children are married and have their own households and family matters to deal with, so everything they did for me was above and beyond.

   Ann, stays current on the latest electronics, computers, cell phones, and in general what I think of as high tech socializing.   Cindy and I ask  her when we need general help about those things. She got Cindy into facebooking.   Texting is something I do about once a year.  Twitting I'm not sure if you do that with your phone or computer, and I not going to ask any of our children.  I'm sure a lot of you are like me, my 9 year old grand-daughter laughs about how little I know about i-pads i-phones and so forth.

After Christmas I had an appointment with my cardiologist.  By this time I had lost 45 pounds, my cholesterol was good.   He agreed I was ready to fully resume walking, increasing my distance but needed to closely monitor my heart rate.  His instructions were as your strength improves your body will let you know what your limitations are.  "You will know what you can and can not do, don't push yourself beyond that point."

The last 3 months had been the most difficult of recuperating.  My lungs had cleared, I was getting stronger, I was improving and was ready to work on getting healthy.

Today for lunch I had oatmeal, and it was good, yeah I had oatmeal for breakfast too.  Snacked at 10:00 on a tangerine and a banana.

Pass The Oatmeal Please #4

   We have already talked about how I felt about a diet would not work for me, I wanted to completely change my eating habits, losing weight would be a benefit of that but not my ultimate goal.  I felt confident that my approach should be to eliminate foods, and eating habits that were bad for me.  For years after most, not all, but most meals I felt stuffed, like normal eaters would feel after Thanksgiving dinner. So I needed to eat less at meals and still be hungry.   I'm sorry but it's not going to be easy for us who have bad eating habits to change. If you're going to lose weight, and keep it off,  you're going to have to experience being hungry until your body and mind begin to adjust to the new you. And when you start losing that first few pounds you're going to feel good about yourself. And when you start having to tighten up on that belt, and clothes that were tight in the waist begin to feel just a little bit loser, you're not going to mind being hungry anymore.  It won't take as long as you thought and you'll begin to feel good about what your doing and believe that you can do this.
    I  knew if I eliminated red meat I was going to lose weight. The good thing for me was my eating so much meat, if I could give it up, that would be a major step in weight loss.  I would get the health benefits of a lot less red meat.  Now let me say this.  I am not a vegetarian, and I do continue to eat some red meat.   My wife makes vegetable soups, some with meat. Beef.  I am not a cook,  she could tell you how she does it, but I assure you the meat is not prepared in a way to make it more unhealthy.  You don't have to quit eating meat to lose weight and change to healthier eating habits.  It is all about you, what you want to do about changing. Being dedicated and ready to change.  Reducing red meat by 99 percent was one of my choices.  I simply got tired of meat, period, that includes chicken, turkey, and fish.  I am currently probably not eating enough chicken and fish for protein. Once every several  months I get hungry for my favorite meal, spaghetti. So I eat spaghetti.  But that's it for me. Some meat in some soups anytime I want it, and spaghetti, 3 or 4 times a year.  Remember my heart surgeon, the one  who wears cowboy boots.  My heart surgery was on my 42 wedding anniversary, we were suppose to have been having dinner at Houston's restaurant.  Prime rib would have been my choice.  Anyway he tells me when you get home from the hospital take your wife to Houston's and celebrate, bring some of your steak home and leave it in the refrigerator overnight.  Look at it the next morning, and that is what is going into your arteries.  I didn't order meat for my meal,  but I did do what he suggested and refrigerated cooked steak overnight.  You need to try it too.  If you have survived a heart attack and had heart surgery, do you want that going into your coronary system?
    Right now some of you who have had heart attacks are getting uncomfortable with what I'm saying. Maybe you're not ready to change some old habits, give up some foods. Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about.  My cardiologist and surgeon each told me the same thing. "You were lucky. Most people who are asleep and have the attack you had don't wake up." So if I have a another, final heart attack, there won't be a footnote, "he didn't take care of himself."  I know some guys who have had bypass surgery, no heart attacks, and they continue to smoke, drink and eat anything and as much as they want and don't get much exercise.  I use to be one of them.  I changed, you can change.
   Okay back to where we were.  I was not eating much in the way of fruits and vegetables.  So here was another opportunity, replace sweets, starches, fried foods, chips, soft drinks, with foods like bananas, strawberries, oranges, apples, and green vegetables.   I began by limiting myself to less than 1400 calories per day.  A general day went like this.   Breakfast large bowl of oatmeal,  I like mine thin, almost soupy, I use a 1 (oats) to 4 (water ) ratio.  Nothing else in the oatmeal, I  love it.  I know what you're thinking, my wife also says I'm weird about oatmeal.  Sometimes I eat it for lunch or dinner.  It's filling.  Mid-morning if I want a snack I have an orange or banana.  For lunch one small can of tuna packed in water, not oil, some dill pickles, 5 or 6 saltine crackers and mustard, a sliced small tomato and lettuce.  For desert an apple or orange and a couple of strawberries.  I buy the large bite size freshly packed berries.  Afternoon snack, back to the fruit.  Dinner normally is always either  soup, a  large salad,  or a plain baked potato.  Sometimes I will take maybe left over soup and pour it over the potato. There are a lot of things you could add to it without using sour cream or butter.   At night is always the toughest part for me, that was my old heavy snack time.  I normally will eat a very small serving of yogurt, or fruit, and before bedtime a small (child size glass) serving of skim milk.   I like milk so I save it every night as a treat to look forward to. It is always skim milk. No 2 % or regular milk. 

    I didn't weigh myself a lot.  Started at 240 pounds and got on scales the next time 6 weeks later.  I would have gotten discouraged had I weighed myself every day.

I'll tell you about it later.

Homecoming #3

  The first few days of being home were quite an adjustment.  Getting enough rest, discovering I wasn't as strong and pain free as I thought.  I was taking oxycodone twice a day for pain, and boy did it work.  It wasn't too long before I had a pretty good habit going and I liked it.  Cindy, my wife, referred to oxycodone as that "monkey on your back".  Remember she and my daughter, Michelle, are  also unofficial pharmacists.   I was taking a lot of  medication, like 16 prescription pills daily.  Again Cindy came to my rescue, she realized I would have taken the morning stuff at night, mid-day pills morning and afternoons and so forth and so on, probably would have needed to be stomach pumped a couple of times a week for overdose. She had it all worked out for me, pills organized laid out in handy little containers and labeled, just follow the simple instruction is all that was required of me.  For those of you who have been through this you can see the importance of having first of all an advocate in the hospital. Somebody has got to deal with the Nurse Ratcheds and you're in no condition.  Next a good administrator.  Once home, doctors' office appointments start almost immediately, at least a couple a week, in my case anyway.  Prescriptions have to be filled, picked up, organized, and properly taken.  This goes on for 3 or 4 weeks as things begin to slowly return to normal, and I wasn't sure things really would. Was this going to be normal for me from now on?  You probably wondered the same thing,  were we going to be doomed to taking large doses of medication, monitoring our blood pressure and sitting on the sofa with a remote  control in hand. I quickly got rid of the monkey Cindy had told me about.
   It is approximately 100 yards from my door down to where my drive meets the street.  I took it as a personal challenge after being home for a few days to walk out each morning and get the newspaper. I would have to stop twice going down and once coming back to rest.  It took a week before I could do it round trip with no stops.  Next I challenged myself to extend further out down the street another one hundred fifty yards. Twice a day morning and afternoons I eventually could do it, non stop.  I know it sounds silly, like what's the big deal, but that's what you go through.
    I was on top of the weight loss, eating lots of fruits, vegetables, grains, soups, salads, chicken.  I had continued losing weight and was down to 195.  I was eating healthy, liked it, was confident this was no diet, this was permanent.  I vowed to myself I was going to begin to exercise to strengthen my heart. I was going to regain my overall strength and stamina.  I wanted to go back to normal.

  My first doctors' appointment was to my cardiovascular surgeon.  He is a pretty neat and likable guy, has a great reputation as a surgeon, and is known for a nice, neat incision leaving minimal scar tissue, and the same for vein removal from your leg. It gets better, he likes to big game hunt, and wears cowboy boots in surgery.  Me too, the big game hunting, but I took my boots off during surgery. Problem is I didn't want a little scar left.  At my first appointment he made a big thing of the incision, how well it was healing. "Man you're hardly going to even know it's there, you'll look great at the beach".  I finally told him,  I appreciate it, but I kind of wanted one of those zig zag wide ugly looking scars.  You know the kind I could show off,  tell my buddies look what happens when Dr. Frankenstein is your heart surgeon.  I'm not sure he saw the humor.  He gets serious and explains that I've got a lung problem.  "You need to be at the hospital tomorrow morning."

  In the next post we'll discuss losing weight, foods I ate, changes I made as I went along.

Not as healthy As I Should Have Been. #2

  I should tell you some things about my health leading to the time of my medical exam prior to the heart attack.  August 2,  6 weeks before the check up I weighed 240 pounds.  My wife and I were returning home by road trip from Florida with my daughter and two grandchildren.  We had been on the road for about 25 miles when we made our first stop at What-A-Burger for mid-morning fries, burger, and giant size soft drinks.  About 3 hours later we did the same at a Sonic in Birmingham, except this time I did the double cheese burger with large order of onion rings.  Enough said of the road trip you get the idea, we still had over 4 hours to go and more stops to make.

  I had been giving a lot of thought to losing weight, my overall health , how to lose weight, and concluded I could not do it by going on a diet.  I was eating too unhealthy, and applied too few controls on myself when it came to food and eating.  I decided my health and body were being damaged by the amount of red meats I was eating.  Not only that, but how it was prepared, what chemicals, preservatives, and enhancers were in it?  What were you consuming when you ate processed meats, hot dogs, sausage, canned meats, and luncheon meats?  I was not eating enough fresh vegetables and fruits.  Most of my vegetables consisted of french fries, baked potatoes, or an occasional salad loaded with dressing.  All of my meals included a sizeable portion of red meat.  Snacks included red meat.  There was one I especially enjoyed, after dinner, before bed, a snack of deli meats, usually ham or roast beef, most times both.  I did not eat much chicken unless fried with skin on.  I liked the crunch.  I wanted to lose weight, and change to a healthy life style.  I knew I could not do it by going on a diet, I was going to change more than how much or how often I ate.  Remember the road trip, coming back from Florida?   Returning home that night I decided I had eaten my last burrger and fries.  I was ready to change and tomorrow would be the beginning of a healthier me.  I went out that day and bought  books on calorie counting, fat, carbohydrates, nutritution, eat this, don't eat that,  salads, nutritional values of vegetables, fruits, and passed my first test when I met my daughter and grandson for lunch at backyard burger and had a Caesar salad and water.  I knew I was on my way to a new me.

  We are going to change subjects for a moment to clarify some information about my blog and its purpose.  I was successful in losing 60 pounds, and changing to eating healthy foods.  Took responsibility for my health, survived a heart attack, heart surgery, two lung surgical procedures, complications of heart surgery, and began rehabbing my body.  This all happening in 3 months.  I am going to share my experiiences with you, what worked for me, what didn't work and most importantly, even though you have had a heart attack or heart surgery you need to know it is never too late to improve your health, live a healthier active life, and enjoy the benefits of good health.  I am going to give you details about diet, exercise, my opinions on foods, and their health benefits based on my personal use, results, research, and experiences.

   After the heart surgery I remained in the hospital for 8 more days.  I was fortunate in that I did not experience much pain after the surgery.  Almost none in the chest or incision area, however my leg was quite swollen and painful from the artery incisions.  36 hours after surgery I was up and walking with assistance down a hospital corridor a couple of times a day.  My room was on the cardiology patient floor of the hospital, rehab, patient care, meals,everything on that floor was directed towards heart patients.  You know I think that was the first time in my life I can recall not having any appetite.  I would have thought being on the cardio floor they would have been overly sensitive to what foods were offered for patient meals.  Eggs in the morning, with bacon, white bread toast, milk, butter, I still wonder why they offered that kind of  nutrition to heart patients.   Remember me telling you about my wife being my medical advisor.  She spent every night sleeping in my room on one of those little hard overnight beds, almost 2 weeks.  Let me tell you, I was so glad to have her there with me, one morning at 5:00 am two nurses walk in, I'm soundly asleep, and they announce loudly "wake up, we need to weigh you."  Imagine a mother grizzly in deep hibernation being awakened by someone disturbing her cub.  Those two nurses starting backing up to the door as my wife came out of bed questioning the intelligence of waking and weighing a heart patient at that time of the morning.  They came back after breakfast and weighed me. 
  A few days later I was strong enough to be discharged, went home, and took another step in returning to a healthier and new me.

Life Changing Experiences #1

  On September 13 I had an appointment with my family doctor, one of a twice a year check up and medical exam.  Blood test, general review, how do you feel, any health problems, that sort of thing. My doctor and I talked about my complaint of pain in my left arm and elbow. This had been bothering me for the past couple of months.  Probably nothing more than pains and aches associated with getting older, I was glad to hear the doctor say that.  Your cholesterol is good (185) heart beat and rate is strong, blood pressure is good.  My doctor said "you're strong and in good health for your age, see you in six months."  I didn't ask any questions like why is cholesterol 185 good, what is my blood pressure, should I monitor it, what's high or low?  No, why ask questions, if your doctor says you're good to go , don't rock the boat? 
  Four nights later around midnight I wake up with very intense pain in my left elbow.  I am sure intense does not describe how strong the pain I felt.  Not throughout my entire arm, but concentrated exactly in the elbow, it throbbed with pain and was getting worse.  I knew what was probably happening, I thought if I deny it to myself it will go away, heart attacks happen to someone else, they aren't for me.  After two hours of denying terrible pain I decided I should wake my wife.  The pain was becoming more severe, my wife wanted to call 911, she knew what was happening, but I convinced her it wasn't a heart attack, but maybe she should drive me to the hospital emergency room,  you know to check out the elbow pain.  We were 15 minutes from the hospital,  I told her "take your time no need to drive fast, don't go through red lights, no need to rush", it was 4:00 am and no traffic.  About 5 minutes away things got worse quickly,  the pain was spreading throughout my arm, my chest getting tight and I was having difficulty getting my breath, I didn't tell her, I just said you may want to really speed up and run red lights.
  I remember telling someone in the emergency room I thought I was having a heart attack, their taking my blood pressure and telling me, "you are," after that I don't remember much clearly until the next morning.

Lets take a brief break here.  I am Danny L. a 65 year old who had a heart attack in the early fall of 2009.  Until that time I lived what I thought was a healthy and active life style but was in fact just the opposite.  Since the heart attack I have learned how to live a healthy life and to be more active.
My intent is to share my experiences of recovering and improving health for those of you like me, who have survived heart attacks and heart surgery, and want to enjoy a healthier and active life style.

Mid-morning a cardiologist came into my room telling me I had been lucky, I had indeed had a heart attack, he thought the damage to my heart was not severe and I would be okay.  I still couldn't say heart attack, I couldn't believe that had happened to me, my health was too good, remember four days ago I had been proclaimed to be in great health for my age. Now here I lay heart monitor probes glued to my chest, needles and tubes sticking into fingers and arms and I am referring to the heart attack as the event in the emergency room.  My cardiologist scheduled me the following morning for an angioplasty procedure to check for artery blockage and open them using stents.  He felt certain my condition could be treated with this procedure.  I had never had surgery and had no idea of what to expect, my cardiologist gave me the disturbing news that I would not be completely asleep and I would be able to see what was going on.  Since I was still in denial I certainly did not want to know what was happening as they inserted a probe into my thigh and ran it up through an artery into my heart, and I was telling them that as they wheeled me into the operating room.  I knew enough that I was only in the operating room a short time and during the procedure remember hearing the surgeon telling someone, "his heart disease is too severe, he can not be treated with stents."

My wife and our oldest daughter consider themselves to be physician/pharmacist without official medical degrees.  The fact of not being official does not stop them from practicing on their cooperating  spouse, children, grandchildren and any other willing family member.   However I found them to be quite dedicated to my medical best interest and useful in interpreting for me what was happening procedure wise, what the doctors were telling me , along with asking the doctors and nurses questions I didn't ask.  When the cardiologist came in, told me I needed heart surgery, I needed it quickly, and he was scheduling me for early the next morning I dropped the denial.

to be continued