I am a very light sleeper. Very light. The last three nights, right around 1 am, an alarm has gone off in our bedroom. It was a high-low tone, like a European police siren, but soft. There was only one thing that I knew of in my room that would produce a sound like that:

My ICD/pacemaker.

It was supposed to alert, if it needed to, at 10:10 am. But the way my medical care has gone, WHO KNOWS. Oh, I ransacked the room to make sure. The first thing I checked was my iPod, which coincidentally I'd brought up stairs three nights ago from its usual spot by my chair. I couldn't find an alarm clock on it.

So finally after I heard the tone again last night/this morning, I tried to find a sample sound at Medtronic (the ICD maker), but only found a note saying if you heard that sound to call your doctor IMMEDIATELY. So I did, and they said to call in when the clinic opened to have my unit tested.

I freaked out about what could have caused my unit to malfunction. The thought of going back into that hospital and having them screw around with my implant--it was more than I could bear. It's just too soon. I remember it all too well.

Finally John said, look, search on iPod alarm and see what you can find out. I just don't think it's your ICD. I found a tutorial on using your iPod alarm clock. Yes, it has one. Went through the steps. Found it, and discovered that the damn thing had somehow been programmed to give a soft, European police siren-y sound at, you guessed it, 1 am. I burst into tears of relief, and turned off the alarm.

I have successfully resisted the urge so far to throw the goddamned thing out the window.

Technorati Tags: Chronic Illness Support [9]