Love: A Language the heart understands.
I met Salamah during my third year at school; I developed a strange feeling for her the very first time I set my eyes on her. She was beautiful, intelligent, and religious.
"Have you ever fallen in love? Do you know what it means to fall in love!?" Brother Hameed had asked me these questions - I had requested to know about LOVE.
Brother Hameed is a Cardiologist, a preacher of love, a counsellor and a medical Health Advocate whose vast knowledge I revere.
As an aspiring Cardiologist, I had walked up to him for explanations on how love can affect a "visceral and solid" organ of our body - The Heart. Don't be surprised; I'm always curious and somewhat inquisitive - I always want to know! I looked intensely into Dr Hameed's face, it held expressions I couldn't make out. After what seemed an eternity, his lips parted for words.
Your Heart should be taken properly care of! It is an organ that understands Languages; it interprets feelings and emotions; it understands love and heartbreak; one becomes dead once it refuses to beat; the whole system of a living organism is affected once it becomes infected - Our Hearts, Our existence!
I'd love to share my life's story with you, listen with rapt attention, I hope you learn from it. My life's story would bring forth today's discussion.
I met Salamah during my third year at school; I developed a strange feeling for her the very first time I set my eyes on her. She was beautiful, intelligent, and religious. I had always kept my eyes on her, till I felt I couldn't bear the feelings I had developed for her - I decided to make her realize this!
At that time, she was in her fourth year in Pharmacy school - I was in my final year. I made her know about my feeling through an intermediary - she was a friend. It took her a long time before she accepted me into her life, I was the happiest person in the universe when I got her reply.
I had never been happier the very moment we tied the knot. I loved her, I used to bless the day our paths crossed, and I still do. Life, indeed, is a mystery we all cannot unravel!" Dr Hameed smiled, wryly.
Whatever it was that had happened after Dr Hameed and his wife got married is what I'm yet to know, I longed to hear it.
At that moment, I realized the expression the Doctor's face held. It held pain, fear and abject sorrow.
"Life, at times, takes away from us something or someone we most cherish.
I'd always awakened to the beauty I never can describe before a catastrophe struck.
A year after, I noticed my wife waned and waxed drastically; her body displayed symptoms we'd thought and believed were typhoid. It wasn't after she underwent several tests, that we come to realize what was eating her up - _Cancer_. The "great" malady invaded her healthy tissues and cells. It did territorially live in her, as though it had been sent. Cancer asphyxiated Salamah by absolutely taking over her whole being. I had watched her struggle with the "invader" till she took in her last breath.
I became so lonely. I felt my world crumbling before me. I became a shadow of myself. I shooed everyone away from me. Everything around me became irritating. I couldn't move on.
Two years after the incident, things hadn't gotten better in my life. I just knew I was breathing. Salamah's departure was what I never seemed to get over, it was agonizing!
I had gone to see a friend of mine, Farid - He's a colleague. I had noticed some symptoms that I couldn't fathom - Angina (sudden and severe chest pains), arrhythmia (irregular pattern of heartbeats) and some other symptoms.
I narrated all these to Farid, he suggested I went for ECG - Electrocardiogram (A test that shows how the heart beats. It was discovered that I'd been suffering from "Broken Heart Syndrome."
Broken Heart Syndrome (also known as Takostubo Cardiomyopathy or Stress Cardiomyopathy or Apiocal Ballooning Syndrome) is a temporary and reversible condition of the heart, whose symptoms are very similar to a Heart attack.
It occurs when sudden physical and emotional stress causes a rapid weakening of the heart's muscles.
Researchers have made us understand that: our bodies tend to react to physical or emotional stress, by releasing stress hormones like Adrenaline, non-adrenaline, epinephrine and non-epinephrine in our blood. Researchers have made us understand that these hormones temporarily interfere with our hearts' function.
Broken Heart Syndrome: disrupts the heart's normal and steady rhythm, causes temporary enlargement of the lower part of the left ventricle (a part of the heart), and results in forceful contractions in some areas of the heart - these changes, however, cause the temporary failure of the heart's muscle.
This syndrome results from several occasions and effects; some of them may include: Fear; extreme anger; health issues (like Asthma, seizure, low blood sugar); loss of a loved one; use of certain drugs like Nasal contestants, Anti allergies, cocaine and some others.
Broken Heart Syndrome's symptoms - severe chest pains, shortness of breath, irregular heartbeats, high blood pressure - are very similar to Heart attacks, except that unlike in Broken Heart Syndrome; the sufferer has blocked coronary arteries or permanent heart damage, and it isn't reversible.
As I've mentioned, BHS is reversible. How can it be managed and treated?
Management of stress cardiomyopathy (Broken Heart Syndrome) mainly consists of supportive and symptomatic treatments. The treatments of this syndrome remain experiential; with a good initial medical support system, patients with the syndrome show excellent improvement.
Some of the treatments and medications administered to Broken Heart Syndrome patients are as follows:
ACE (Angiotensin-convertingEnzyme) inhibitor medicine__:- These medications help relax the veins and arteries to lower blood pressure. These inhibitors prevent an enzyme in the body from producing _angiotensin_, a substance that narrows and constricts blood vessels.
Beta-blocker medicines_:- medicines like Atenolol, are used to treat high blood pressure.
Blood-thinner medicines_:- They are used to prevent blood clots from forming. They help blood flow smoothly through the veins and arteries.
Psychotherapy_:- This is highly important and recommended. The sufferer should talk it out with someone. It relieves and makes the pain less. Most times, we feel less burdened when we get someone to listen to our worries.
I did talk to Farid about all I'd been facing. He took an immense part in my healing process. I became whole again!
Moving on after the lost one can be extremely difficult, but with time, we'd get to realize that: the people we lost had come to make certain changes in our lives, they'd come and left, but will forever be remembered.
Sometimes, we don't lose loved ones to the other world, they'd left and abandoned us due to some reason. It may seem very hard to move on with life, but then, we've got to realize that: they left our lives to give chances to beautiful souls, which will come to stay with us forever.
I hope you learned lessons. I hope I've done justice to the term "Love: A Language the heart understands."
I wished the discussion hadn't ended. I learned a lot from Dr Hameed - My Role model.
"Thank you so much for the great, intriguing and beautiful enlightenment. I hope to learn more from you. I'm immensely grateful to have you." I said with a broad smile.
Written by: Aa’ishah Ajibola Omowumi