HONESTY OR SAFETY?

A few days ago I wrote a blog about honesty.

But now I am going to tell you why I, er, didn't exactly lie, but definitely did not reveal, ah, all the available information.

I know all about what chest pain can/may/does reveal - hey, if nothing else, I worked for the American Heart Association for almost seven years - and I was CPR-certified - and man, can you image being administered to by Charlie and Desmond... okay, just Desmond (sigh).

Okay, back to the story line here, Hope.

My husband has been taken (by me) numerous times to the emergency room with the checklist of symptoms that fit a heart attack to a T - severe and sudden chest pressure, pain radiating down one or both arms, shortness of breath.

And each and every time, after the EKG, blood tests, monitoring and sitting for several hours, the doctors scratch their heads, and admit that although they have NO no idea what this is, it was certainly NOT a heart attack.

So my little episodes of chest pressure, not really PAIN, in the evening, usually last about an hour or two - I've explained it away to myself as tension (my husband is home after work hours - enough said) - mentioned it to my regular physician - made an appointment with a cardiologist for early next month.

Which was all fine and great... until yesterday.

Yesterday I woke up to find a bowling ball sitting right in the middle of my chest.

No, not a real one, silly, but it felt like that. And although it was heavier than my regular chest pressure, I waited for it to go away.

And waited.

And waited.

Finally, after almost twelve hours of it, I decided that I would have to do something - otherwise, I'd either stay up all night or go ahead and take my sleeping medication and drift off to sleep expecting to die in my sleep.

(I'm not quite there just yet)

So to me, at least, the obvious, logical answer was to drive myself the 20 miles or so to the nearest emergency room.

My husband can't drive after dark, let alone in the rain - and it was almost 7 p.m., with thunder and lightening surrounding our area [SIDEBAR: It is only in Arizona that we get excited about the FORECAST for 'possible' MOISTURE]

And my son was sound asleep, and would be going into work at 4:30 a.m.

If I had a real heart attack, I could just call 911 - but after 12 hours of the same pain, I mean, come ON - it was obviously something else.

And I hate hate hate being in an emergency room when you are NOT the emergency - and I am fully aware of how irritable my husband gets (when he IS the emergency and when he is NOT the emergency) - and I saw no reason to wake my SON up to take me.

Okay, okay - maybe I was not "up-front" - but that isn't lying - and it wasn't anything to do with my heart.

(And they have no idea WHAT is causing it - guess I just need to stop going to the lanes so much)

And no, Henry Ian Cusick (Desmond) wasn't there - maybe next time.

LDS RS YW EQ HP

Before my husband joined the military, I had limited exposure to acronyms.

I mean, other than the regular ones, like ASAP, CPR, FUBR and PBJ.

But then the Army stomped all over us with TDY, PCS, CI, RIMPAC, MILPO, MOS...

I cringed at even the thought of acronyms for years. To understand my husband at all, I was forced to address my phobia, and even stop my support of the AAAAAA - the Association for the Abolition of Abused Abbreviations and Asinine Acronyms.

And becoming a member of the LDS church... well, that contributed to my dread, but I also had to learn to deal with it constantly (hence the title, for you fellow Mormons).

Then I went back to full-time, regular employment.

Suddenly I was up to my NECK in AHA lingo (AHA is American Heart Association).

And not just CPR or the HHA (at first we were the Hawaii Heart Association, and later became AHA, Hawaii Affiliate).

But ALL the programs that AHA offered back then - Schoolsite, Worksite, Communitysite and Healthsite - and the acronyms that AHA used, HHA used, the Programs Department (all two of us), and I created myself.

(Okay, well, maybe the ones I invented weren't so tough for me to deal with)

But now I can deal with almost any acronym - so I'm going to share a couple I found:

H.O.P.E - Housing Opportunities For People Everywhere - also Helping Other Parents Endure and Help Overcome Professional Explotation

R.B.B.B. - it doesn't just stand for Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers; it also stands for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus

Check it out yourself at http://www.abbreviations.com/ . Put in your name and see what it comes up with.