The beginnings of recovery - the Dragon’s back (again)
and again and again
It’s just a short while ago now. Back in the first couple of weeks of June. Once again I had decided that I was going to make it to the top of Cader Idris this year. I had already put off a Spring summit because something just wasn’t right. I decided that September, for my birthday, would be good.
I duly began my recovery program. Not far from where I live is the perfect training ground for me. High above Tanygrisiau is a dam. Stwlan Dam. It encloses a reservoir that powers the Hydro-electric scheme lower down. There is a tarmac road that runs from the village up to the old bus stop and view point. The Crosville R40 route used to turn around here. I can remember it running around the end of the 1980’s, but I’m not sure when it stopped. The road was eventually locked some time before lockdown. These days it’s well known as a cycling route because of its rather punishing gradient, especially the last sting of the tail near the top. Thus it makes an excellent and convenient way of getting the heart pumping.
It took me a few goes over a week to get to the top. Boy, did it hurt. There was an iron band across my chest and I couldn’t breathe for love nor money. I made it of course. It involved lots of stops to let the pain subside. My head was swimming and my vision went quite blurry at one point. I just put it down to being unfit. I had been feeling a bit under the weather for a couple of months. Nothing unusual when you live up here. Just getting through the winter is a bloody miracle. I wasn’t that worried. I put it down to my body having a reaction to a medication I had been prescribed at the back end of 2024 - Doxasozin. One of the side effects can be a form of stable angina. I had been prescribed the stuff to assist in lowering my blood pressure that was still high in spite of taking Ramipril and Tildiem. I was fine on just 2mg a day, not too bad on 4mg but I began to suffer on 6mg. I wasn’t enjoying it.
Of course, like anything of this nature it had been building in intensity for many months and probably for years even before I stroked out in 2018.
I can recall quite a few occasions when I felt the same symptoms as far back as around 2010. One particular time as I was struggling up through the snow to the summit plateau on Cader Idris. I turned back that day. A few weeks later I was scampering all over Yr Wyddfa. I simply attributed it to getting over a chest infection. I recall thinking that on a number of occasions. Some days I would be travelling at 7/8 km per hour, others at way less than half that. Yet my resting Pulse Rate hovered around the mid 50’s. Not a patch on the 35 BPM during a Naval fitness assessment in my 20’s. But, why would it be? Was I bovvered? As someone once famously said. Not a bit of it. I just worked harder and faster. By this time I had cut my load carrying down to under 10kg. A few years before, a daily pack weight of 60+kg was not uncommon.
Like any intense physical activity, there are good days and bad days. Walking in the mountains was my greatest joy. I wasn’t going to stop for something so seemingly inconsequential.
My average time on the hill when I was working was around 5/6 hours. There could be the odd long day of 10+ hrs. Especially in the summer months
After I “retired” in 2010 I cut that time in half or less. Mostly I justified this as being down to walking on my own or with my dogs.
Most summits were attainable in 50/60 minutes, maybe a bit longer if there was a longer walk-in. The Rhinogydd for example. A descent at a gentle jog would be around half that. One remarkable descent had me on top of the hills near my home at 15.00 and down at the school gates in the village at 15.20. I wasn’t really aware of any material change. Even after my stroke, when I had been prescribed statins and anti-coagulants. Which I stopped taking because they made me feel so ill, I simply put down everything to being unfit and lazy. Within 18 months I was back out in the hills and even climbing again. It bloody hurt though. My feet burned. My legs ached and I had fall after fall. A time up on the Glyderau with my eldest daughter had me hopping about in pain. Yet I was still outwalking anyone I knew. Only one person could keep up with me and he was in his 70’s. Ross died just a couple of years ago quite suddenly after beating prostate cancer. We had been walking and working together since 1995.
Around 2010 I began to go deaf and suffer from tinnitus. Probably all linked.
I had plenty of falls. Tearing muscles and ligaments in my ankles, knees and hips. Landing heavily on my hands or getting them twisted up in the pole straps caused whiplash type injuries to my neck and shoulders.
Every ache and pain I simply shrugged off with a “well, what should I expect after a lifetime of physical abuse”
This time however I was concerned.
I booked myself in at our local Health Centre at the Blaenau Memorial Hospital to see the clinician. He wasn’t available that day. I got seen by a GP, who listened to my concerns. Concurred with my plan to reduce the drug slowly and come off it. I had already started a few days earlier right after my last walk up to the dam. To be on the safe side I was booked in to have a cardio ultrasound scan at Alltwen hospital in Porthmadog. The appointment came through in a matter of days and I spent a pleasant hour being scanned. The upshot was that specialist felt that I should have an Angiogram, so the referral was sent off. I didn’t expect to hear anything for a few weeks. In a matter of days the Cardio Lab at Betsy Cadwallader were on the phone and I was booked in for the following week
Follow more in the next episode
First published on dragonfly.cymru