After eight hours in emergency room yesterday, a half-dozen blood tests and several injections of who knows what, radioactive lung tests, doppler and ultrasound exams, and several hours of sitting on bed staring blankly at walls and trying to keep covered (hospital gowns!) - I got the bad news. The reason I've felt so bad since flying last month is DVT - deep venous thrombosis - and a hefty clot had formed in my left leg, causing all sorts of grief. Dizzy spells, fainting, falling-over-sorts of activities, cold sweats, a whole host of strangeness. So, they started me off on a set of injections designed to thin my blood - fractionated heparin - can't read the name on the slip here, since it was written by a doctor. This goes on for seven days, and meanwhile they started me on Coumadin, which is designed to stabilize things and stop more clots from forming, and if I understand it, make this one diminish (or not - I've heard arguments both ways). They were calm and professional in their advice, up to and including the moment when they informed me of the consequences of not taking treatments - about 60,000 folks die from this each year if they do not get treatment and make lifestyle changes. So... I'm getting treatment and making lifestyle changes. I have too much life left ahead of me and too many things to do to ignore this. Wish me well - posts may get a bit sparse while I get things under control.

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