Heart Infection a.k.a Infective Endocarditis

This must have been the 3rd time I'm hospitalized in my life and I definitely hope it's the last time. This is also the longest time I've been hospitalized and guess what? I still have 2 weeks to go. 

It all started with me feeling tired and getting chills every night. Little did I know that these were the symptoms of infective endocarditis or more commonly known as a heart infection. For those of you guys who don't know, I was born with a congenital heart problem. 

I have a bicuspid valve which means that one of the valves in my heart, namely the aortic valve has only two flaps instead of three in a normal person. So instead of having the Mercedes looking valve, I only have a pathetic looking two flap valve. 

For people like me, I'm much more prone to infections in my heart, especially on my valves. I would have never thought that this would happen to me just cause of several episodes of fever and chills. The greatest worry was that I lost all my appetite and almost became anorexic. I lost a whopping 10kg in a month and that was when the red light came up and after the non stop nagging from Petrine I finally got to see a doctor.

 So I was admitted and they found out that there was some bacteria that had formed a vegetation on my valve and it was almost half the size of my valve. A normal valve is about 2cm and my vegetation was almost 1cm. 

Luckily that wasn't a clear cut sign for immediate surgery but surgery is probably required in the later parts of my life. I really don't want to go through another surgery because ultimately the risks are pretty high and I'd have to be on life-long medication once I'm operated on. 

As of now, I'm going to be on 4 weeks on inpatient antibiotics which meant that I'll have to be hospitalized for 4 weeks and the doctors will have to take things from there. I'm pretty glad for Petrine who visits me religiously bringing me the best food that I could ever ask for. 

Of course not forgetting some of my friends who have visited me as well. I only got to snap a picture with Raphael and Calvin though. 

Other than the 4 hourly anti biotics, I'm pretty much fine. For you guys who are intending to visit me, I would urge you not to because the hospital is full of germs and it's really bad if you have a low immunity system. I appreciate all the get-well-soon texts and I hope to get well soon too. It's a good break from the mundane working life but it's not the kind of break I would like to have.