I wake one morning to a staggering heart.
Tiny quick tiptoes followed by long slow staggers.
It’s like my heart is drunk, slurring and panicking and not knowing what to do next.
I know I’m not having a heart attack, as my youth was punctuated by panic attacks.
But still, it feels unnerving.
It goes on for a week, nearly constantly.
I go to the doctor.
They do an ECG.
She tells me I have atrial fibrillation and will need heart surgery, soon.
She says it’s unusual, because I’m so young.
I ask if it might be because I have low iron.
I’ve just been put on the strongest iron tablets, because I was teetering on the edge of dangerously low levels.
She doesn’t respond.
She puts me on blood thinners so that I don’t develop a blood clot.
It’s my birthday the next day.
I’m turning 38.
They ask me to do a 24-hour ECG, so I have stickers taped across my chest through the night and wires plugged into a small device.
The results are sent to the cardiologist who decides, fairly swiftly, that there is nothing to worry about.
It’s just heart palpitations.
I put it down to stress.
This is from a new poetry collection I’m working on, about perimenopause.