Brett,
I understand your feelings. I had similar ones after my OHS. As I have related before, I have a strong belief in the power of my mind. Before my OHS, which was scheduled for 6-8 hours as it was a quintuple one, I programmed my subconscious for two things: not to need the external blood pump and to wake up. This might have worked too well, for while I did did not need the pump, I woke up after four hours, which caused the anesthesiologist to panic as waking too early can cause brain damage. The doc kicked my wife out of the recovery room but after he unsuccessfully tried to stop me from reaching for the tube in my mouth, he asked my wife to come back since I seemed to respond to her. Her quietly threatening me that if I did not stop reaching, they would tie my hands down, caused me to stop reaching and relax so my recovery became more orderly. I relate this to indicate what I believe are examples of the strength of our minds. I also do not like to be medicated.
After backing out of an MRI, I used these two traits to mentally prepare myself to have my mind "take me someplace else" during the procedure and avoid being medicated. I recommend making sure your arms do not touch the sides of the machine, as this kept reminding me of where I was. I also use this technique for long dental procedures.
I should add that you should not feel in any way badly about your fears. Fear is one of the feelings we are born with, and serves as a major protector. Embrace it, but also manage it.
Hope this is helpful.
Brent Zepke
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Brent Zepke
Santa Barbara CA
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-18-2020 15:26
From: Brett Temple
Subject: Post OHS Anxiety - Update
I had posted on here a couple months ago about not being able to finish a non-heart related MRI due to suddenly having an attack of claustrophobia that caused me to have a panic attack while I was in the machine, something I had never experienced before. I knew it had to somehow be related to my OHS as I had been through a half dozen MRIs in the past, before my OHS, and never experienced any kind of claustrophobia. They rescheduled me for another MRI that I went to a couple of days ago but this time gave me Lorazepam to take before the procedure to help me relax. It didn't work. As soon as they put me in the tube I immediately had to tell them to take me out. My heart started beating a hundred miles an hour and I felt like I couldn't breath. As soon as they took me out, I was fine. Last night that I finally made the connection and it was definitely related to my surgery. Here is the problem:
When I woke up in recovery after my OHS, I was still intubated with that giant tube-within-a-tube down my throat. I woke up feeling like I was choking to death and immediately started thrashing around trying to yank it out of my throat. Fortunately they had me strapped down (I'm guessing for this very reason) so I wasn't able to get to it myself and they took it out pretty quickly afterwards. I realized that when they put me in the MRI machine where I couldn't raise my arms or sit up my subconscious mind immediately goes back to that feeling of being strapped down to that table and not being able to breath. On one hand, it's a relief to finally know where this is coming from but on the other hand I'm not sure how to overcome it. They rescheduled me for another MRI for next week (my third attempt) except with a stronger medicine than before but don't know if that will help or not. Is there anyone else on here who has experienced this issue who may have a recommendation on how to overcome it? I thought about trying hypno-therapy to see if that would help. Thoughts anyone?
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Brett Temple
Project Manager
Sarasota FL
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