“My heart skips a beat.” In fact it has been doing so more lately, seemingly in step with me losing weight. But nothing like what happened today. This hasn’t happened since 2005.

Today I had a heart episode, and to some extent still have. Not an infarct, it seems: I just came home from the clinic and they did an EKG. As always it was perfect. The only thing unusual is that while I was out walking, my pulse began to go up and up until it stabilized at 190, probably my max pulse. Well, that certainly qualifies as an episode in my book, although it happened twice in 2005 as well.

I had left my cell phone at home again, but luckily I had just passed a school where some event was going on, and a handful of parents were out in their cars. I showed them my pulse watch and they called an ambulance. When it arrived, my pulse had gone down into normal human range (although not my range, and it is still about 40 higher than usual. Like 100 when sitting, 120-130 when standing or walking slowly.)

They drove me to the local clinic where a Swedish doctor checked me. Apart from a slight fever (and human heartbeat instead of superhuman) I was in great shape. Even my blood sugar was 5.2 mmol. (This won’t mean anything to Americans.) I explained that it is ALWAYS 6.1, even after 12 hours without food and with an hour’s walk thrown in. They seemed to think it was great that it had gone down. Evidently I can now have perfect blood sugar, at the price of my heart running much faster. I would not be surprised if one of these was an effect of the other, but nobody else seemed to think so.

I had a slight fever: 38.8C (101.8F), and the doctor wondered if that might be the reason. I really don’t think a fever suddenly appears over the course of half a minute. It is more likely the other way around. Or perhaps whatever caused this episode also caused the fever. I have had 3 ticks suck on me this past week, but I killed them all young and put antiseptic salve on the wounds. No red rings this time like some years ago. Still… hmm. I cannot remember how many years ago that was. It is theoretically possible that the body ran across some tick protein and went crazy, but I find it unlikely. The temperature is already down to less than 38, so not fever for normal humans. (I usually have a little lower.)

I drank a glass of juice and water a while after I came home, to check whether the higher pulse was really caused by my lower blood sugar. (Normal human pulse with normal human blood sugar, instead of lower pulse with higher sugar.) That makes sense if there is plenty of oxygen, in which case blood sugar might be the bottleneck in the body’s operations.  However, the pulse remained in nearly the same range. The only thing that gets it down a bit is meditation, but I do that only for a few seconds at a time. I am not sure whether it would be wise to consciously lower the heart rate, as I may be able to do in meditation. Didn’t I just worry a few days ago when it fell to 50? Be careful what you wish for, you might get it!

In any case, there you have it. If I die before I wake, I fully intend to not haunt you, and not check whether my grave is kept clean. If I don’t die – or something very close to it – you can expect to hear from me again.