We were out doing some Christmas shopping when Namine said her chest hurt. It’s not uncommon for her to have pain, since she has so many scars, but she said this pain felt like it was inside her chest. So we headed to the hospital.
Namine had a chest X-ray and an EKG. (“Stickers and wires to listen to my heart,” Namine called it.) Nothing definitive came back; her heart itself was fine. That by no means ruled out that Namine was experiencing real pain, however; it was just as likely that it was one of the wires in Namine’s chest.
Namine has had heart surgery three times in the journey to make her heart defect a livable condition; open heart surgery two times. As a result, she has metal wires keeping her sternum closed. The ER doctor suspected one of these wires was poking her. Another possibility was that the cartilage in her sternum was inflamed.
Namine was discharged from the hospital, since there was nothing wrong with her heart. We left with instructions to follow up with Namine’s primary doctor and cardiologist if the pain persisted.
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