Did anyone here have no symptoms of the ASD until having a stroke? I never knew anything about the ASD - I had no heart murmur or anything like that. I did have a treadmill test a few years ago for insurance purposes, but it all came back normal. So, when I had the stroke on December 11, 2017, I was totally surprised. There was a hole in my heart and the left side of my heart was much smaller than the right side - so my heart had never been working correctly.
Anyway, I would really like to find a support group to help me with this “new normal”. I am doing very well, but there are little things that I am finding have changed - my balance on my left side is not very good, my voice goes a little weak when I talk too much, sometimes I have night terrors (better now, I used to have them every night), I get tired more easily, sometimes it is almost like I forget how to swallow, and I can’t walk a straight line for anything. Is there anyone else who had a stroke and is trying to figure out their “new path”?
Hello. I have had no symptoms besides a heart murmur that I’ve had checked over the years without any worry from any of my doctors. I discovered my (likely) ASD through a preventative heart check. I say likely because I don’t know for sure until I have the TEE test this Friday. Cardiologist is quite sure it is an ASD, and said it “sounds like an ASD murmur.” I had no idea they had a particular sound and it makes me wonder why no other doctor has caught this in the 40+ years I’ve known I’ve had a murmur. May I ask how old you are/were when you had the stroke?
I was 53 when I had the stroke - and I never had any murmur or anything.
It was strange that I went that long, had a treadmill test, a kidney
removed and various other medical things and they never found the hole.
Are the doctors suggesting having the implant? I think that I would have
had it, especially if I could have prevented the stroke.
After the cardiologist blowing off my symptoms on Tuesday, I went to my PCP
yesterday. She is wonderful, and had me sit down and tell her everything
that is not “normal” for me. Things like not being able to get my words
out even though I know what to say, sometimes not remembering how to
swallow, my balance on my left side being non-existent, and some pain in my
chest. She told me that all of those things are normal for post-stroke,
and my problem is that I look like there is nothing wrong with me - so it
is easy for me and others to expect things to be back to “normal”. She
said that it could take up to two years for the pieces to all fit again,
and rushing it is doing nothing but frustrating me.
What are you thinking?
I had symptoms for years that I ignored. Dizzy spells, an inability to maintain any kind of strenuous activity and they had mentioned, when I was born, that there was a heart murmur. But I never gave that any thought, and almost failed to see a doctor even after I had a TIA at age 48. But both my parent had been recently lost to complications arisen from strokes. So I begrudgingly went to see a doctor.
It is so good that you did! That TIA was a “wake up” call…and seriously,
if I had the choice to make about having the implant versus the stroke, I
would have had the implant earlier. Although it has its own set of
challenges, the stroke has caused me much more harm. The implant causes
some pain in my chest, shortness of breath, - caused mainly by the
amiodarone. The stroke has caused damage that may never heal.