I’ve been standing still for what seems far longer than two weeks. Doctor’s orders, sort of. While I’m not technically precluded from traveling, I’ve been advised to rest and relax and let my heart recover. Part of this involves ABSOLUTELY NO STRESS, and apparently that involves acting like it’s the heart of lockdowns three years ago.¹

I’m not well, which I know because doctors keep telling me. Also, I occasionally get lightheaded when I stand up.² The problem is, otherwise, I don’t actually feel all that different. It seems I’m far more likely to die getting dizzy at the top of the stairs than from another ischemic attack. I suppose if one must be sick it’s far better to not feel like you are, but it makes me nervous. Mostly I can’t tell if I’m getting any better. I very well might not be; you can’t have half your heart die off and ever get back to where you were before. In theory, though, all this rest is supposed to give my body a chance to get as well as it’s going to get.

To that end I saw a cardiologist shortly after arriving in the UK, who went through my medical records from Poland and sorted through my medications and more or less confirmed everything they had done. The treatments I received were roughly in line with what I’d have expected from a UK hospital and the medications I was on were what my current cardiologist would have sent me off with.³ I’ve got another heart test scheduled in a week to see how I’m recovering and that’ll tell us how things are going. If they’re going badly, I may need to get a defibrillator implanted.⁴ If they’re going fantastically, there’s a chance I’ll be cleared to fly again immediately.⁵ And most likely, if the results are okay to good I’m going to be sitting on my ass for yet another month awaiting another test and more results.⁶

The upshot of all this is there’s nothing I can do to speed things up. I can’t really do exercises to help strengthen my heart.⁷ So I wait, watch television, doomscroll, slowly pick my way through Baldur’s Gate, and try not to think about the year I spent trapped in Ireland during COVID.

In the meantime, I’ve been “working on my lifestyle choices,” which basically means I can no longer eat or drink anything I used to eat or drink so I have to figure out what I can eat and drink.⁸ Anyone who’s met me in the last five years will know I’m largely addicted to diet sodas, mainly Pepsi Max or Coke Zero.⁹ I’ve subsequently cut all that out. Although I haven’t really, because I switched to “flavored sparking water” and having tried a bunch of brands in the UK they’re all really more like diet Sprite if diet Sprite came in flavors like “White Grape and Blackberry” and “Mango and Passionfruit.” I’ve no doubt they’re better than Coke Zero — they typically have real fruit juice added and don’t use artificial dyes — but they’ve still got preservatives and citric acid and artificial sweeteners.¹⁰

What I really desperately want is the kind of minimally flavored seltzer water you can find everywhere in the United States. Make all the LaCroix jokes you want, but it’s fizzy and flavored enough to bypass my distaste for flat water while having a fraction of the additives of soda. That’s just not a thing in the UK, or really anywhere I’ve been except for the US.¹¹ I’m trying to develop a taste for plain carbonated water, but it’s just not the same.¹²

The real loss, of course, is alcohol. I had the misfortune of having a heart attack about a year after all the medical recommendations switched from “a glass of wine or pint of beer every day is recommended” to “there is no safe level of alcohol consumption.” Accordingly, I’ve had a grand total of a half glass of white wine in the past month. I’ve not sworn off the stuff permanently, but it seems wise to cut back in the short term — and given the “low risk” category is now two drinks a week, it may be a while before I start again.

But the real quandary is food. The guidelines for “heart-healthy” foods are a little grim. Fruits and most vegetables are great, high-protein foods like lentils and chickpeas and nuts and tofu are solid,¹³ olive oil is pretty good. But virtually everything else is, as they say, problematic. Stick to low fat milk and low fat cheese.¹⁴ If you eat meat, restrict your intake and limit yourself to lean cuts.¹⁵ Eat whole grains like brown rice and plain oatmeal, which eliminates baguettes and sourdough and ciabatta to say nothing of brioche and croissants. Minimal sugar. Minimal salt. Minimal fat.

Anyone who’s spent any time in a grocery store, to say nothing of a restaurant, will know the vast majority of what’s on offer violates one of the above rules — and since 90% of what’s available is processed, it typically violates at least two or three. This is genuinely a society-wide level problem. It’s not like you can eat anything you want until there’s a problem. The things you’re eating are directly causing the problem.¹⁶

I’ve started the long, difficult process of overhauling my diet. Some of that’s straightforward: I’ve stuck to fresh fruit for breakfast and snacks: apples, plums, apricots, grapes.¹⁷ I’ve cut out appetizers and desserts and cut back on portion sizes. And I’m practically vegan now since I’ve dropped eggs and cheese.¹⁸ Being I’m in one place I’ve even started cooking again a little bit. I bought a low-fat vegan cookbook¹⁹ and just over the past week made Black Bean Mole (quite good), Chickpea Piccata (disappointing), and Split Pea Soup (reliable and comforting).²⁰

It’ll be easy to keep this up if I’m staying in one place. When and if I start traveling again it’s going to be challenging. I suppose I’m going to need to be even more picky about where I’m eating and even more picky about what I’m ordering. But it was ever thus, I suppose. At the moment it’s still a problem for the future and right now I’m focused on getting through the short term. That’s all I need to worry about.

I’m actually traveling, a tiny bit, for the upcoming weekend. In a short while a friend is picking me up to go pick out a costume²¹ and then drag me north to Stafford. I’m playing in Goetia this weekend, or at least I’m going to attempt to play Goetia this weekend. It’s the last larp I’ll attend this year and having had to cancel the last two I didn’t want to lose this one.

I’ve set myself no expectations whatsoever. I’ll count it as a victory if I manage to stay upright and don’t go to sleep before 11pm. At some point I have to start living again, even if I don’t quite know what that’s going to look like, and this seemed like a way to begin.

And that’s the thing about beginnings. I’m nervous, and confused, and apprehensive. But better that then the alternative. Just keep moving forward.

Next: Stafford to Birmingham
Prev: Berlin to London

Footnotes

¹ Incidentally, one of the most stressful times I’ve personally lived through.

² A weird corollary is that I can’t bend over, since that inevitably entails standing back up. I made myself quite sick by bending over too frequently in too short an amount of time digging pots and pans and ingredients out of lower shelves in the kitchen.

³ With the exception of ivabradine, a drug which is supposed to keep your heart rate steady but my UK doctor said has kind of gone out of fashion and probably isn’t doing anything the other drugs aren’t already doing.

⁴ This is unlikely assuming my heart is recovering, but the mere thought of it is a little scary. Of course, what it’s designed to prevent is something called “sudden cardiac death” which is a completely terrifying thing where your heart suddenly stops beating, and I’m at significantly increased risk of it having had a heart attack (both because my heart is recovering and because it’s not like my arteries are suddenly not clogged with cholesterol) so not having a defibrillator is kind of scary as well.

⁵ Which would salvage at least something of my plans for the autumn.

⁶ There are roughly two cutoffs after a heart attack when your risk of having another one drops significantly: six months and ten years. So coddling yourself for a few months after one is very worthwhile. Most of the drugs I’m on are designed to ensure my heart heals the right way; my heart is essentially relearning how to beat, and there’s good and bad ways of doing that.

⁷ Some aerobic exercise would be good but the recommendations start out at a 5 minute walk and build up to 30 minutes over the course of weeks. Exercise is one of the triggers for sudden cardiac death so you can understand their reluctance to push anything more strenuous. I can wait.

⁸ I mean, I certainly could just keep on like nothing had happened — nobody’s got a gun to my head if I order the four cheese macaroni and a slice of Black Forest cake for dinner — but it feels imprudent.

⁹ The reasons are kind of complicated. I certainly drink too much soda to want that much extra sugar every day. I don’t drink coffee or tea much so it’s the only source of caffeine I have. And for the vast majority of restaurants you’re basically choosing between alcohol, soda, or water.

¹⁰ There’s a lot of debate over whether artificial sweeteners are harmful or not. They don’t really seem to be a big cancer risk. They might not be great as a way of managing your weight — the argument is they make your brain think there’s a rush of calories coming because they’re so sweet and when it doesn’t materialize you get hungry and overeat — but even then I find it hard to believe that’s worse than drinking all the sugar in regular soda in the first place.

¹¹ I’m really at a loss as to why minimally-flavored seltzer water isn’t available. My best guess is that mineral water is far more popular than seltzer in most of Europe and it’s a little weird to add artificial flavors to something marketed on its naturally healthy properties. (And yes, I’m familiar with Perrier Lemon.)

¹² I’d consider infusion bottles, but you really can’t transfer carbonated water between bottles without ending up with flat seltzer.

¹³ Eggs are maybe okay. It turns out there’s no real connection between dietary cholesterol and blood cholesterol, but even then you’re recommended to keep consumption to about one a day. And you certainly shouldn’t fry it up in bacon grease. Enjoy your one-egg omelette.

¹⁴ Has there ever been a low-fat cheese worth eating? I remain skeptical.

¹⁵ Fish seems to be regarded as generally okay — good news for fans of salmon — but as a vegetarian that doesn’t help me much.

¹⁶ One of the points the cardiologist made is that at some point in our 20s everybody’s arteries start filling up with gunk as a side effect of our diets — we know pretty precisely when that starts because inner city violence in the United States has resulted in a lot of 20-year-olds getting autopsies and, yep, we can see it — and it continues throughout our lives. That increases everybody’s risk of a heart attack. A significant portion of the drugs I’m on are designed to counter that process. But it would have been far better if I’d been on the drugs six months ago if not six years ago, and there’s a lot more people out there who should be on those drugs but aren’t.

Medication is a terrible way to deal with the problem, though. A far better way is diet. But our diet is largely controlled by multinational conglomerates, and multinational conglomerates make far more money pushing Cheez-Its and Pizza Rolls and Mocha Cookie Crumble Frappuccinos than healthier options.

¹⁷ Weirdly, not oranges. Much as I like them, I don’t like the bother of peeling them or eating around the seeds. I need stuff I can grab and eat without any effort first thing in the morning.

¹⁸ I’m not all that strict about it, but I’m making a conscious effort. The loss of cheese is tragic — I’m really quite upset about it — but I suppose it was a long time coming. I’ll take a functioning heart over burrata or Reblochon or Parmigiano Reggiano, but I admit it’s a tough call.

¹⁹ Appetite for Reduction. I’m still a sucker for Isa Chandra Moskowitz.

²⁰ I’d have taken pictures but a lot of the simplest food to make is the least photogenic. Split Pea soup always looks a little disturbing to my eyes.

²¹ At the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford, increasingly my go-to for UK larps.