My Unfortunate Infarction P3

A Hearty Plumbing Job

Feb 19, 2025

Preface

I am an artist who writes essays, then I illustrate them. All art in this article was drawn specifically for it. I don’t use Ai generative art or stock images. I have worked in the animation industry for decades (prev clients Dreamworks and Sony Animation) and I’m now pivoting to visual storytelling. I do hope you enjoy the art that goes along with this article.

February is 🫀National Heart Month🫀 and a few years back I had a heart attack. This is part three of my four-part story. For parts one and two, click here (1) and here (2) to catch up.

Down The “Rancor” Hole

"Mr. Thigpen, you’re having a heart attack, and we need to admit you.

Do you want some morphine?"

Do I want some morphine?! Does the Pope wear a silly hat? Does a bear shit in the woods and then shame a small rabbit into being it’s Charmin? YES, I WANT MORPHINE.

At that moment, my blood pressure skyrocketed—200 notches higher than when I first met my in-laws. And then... the morphine.

Oh, sweet, beautiful morphine that put me in a “Mad Tea-Party Up at the Hutts” state of mind.

Here is exactly what I saw when the morphine hit… “Down the Rancor Hole”. There might be some Star Wars Easter Eggs hidden in this image, can you find them all?

“I would totally buy ‘Down the Rancor Hole’ and hang it on my wall”.

Well boy-howdy are you in luck as I’m testing a way to sell my work. Click the button below for purchase options.

Purchase "Down The Rancor Hole" here

Time slowed. My problems became someone else’s. I now understand how people get addicted to this stuff. Morphine is like that ex who destroyed your credit, burned down your house, ran off with a sheep farmer from Alabama and then texted “u up?” at 2 AM—completely toxic, but damn that booty call (and the sheep).

Before you get your panties in a twist for me shitting all over Alabama, please note that I’m from that blood red state, I lived there for decades, and I have earned the right to make as many punches as I want towards our state. And if any off you find yourself angry and not laughing because I triggered you… aren’t you part of team “Fuck Ur Feelings?'‘ In other words, get over yourself, Snowflake… I’m just joking. ::wink::

Heartbreak Hotel

So back to me, and my heart attack…

They wheeled me into a shockingly nice hospital room with big windows near the UT campus. This served as a reminder that Heather and I had never attended a Longhorns football game there (and probably never will because football is lame and some of y’all got a problem, getting a hard on worshipping a team and identifying with their mascot much like you do with stupid ass jingoistic politicians)… and that somewhere out there in the UT English department, Matthew McConaughey and Brené Brown were living their best lives while I was very much dying… you’d think celebrities would care more.

Then my next dose of morphine hit, and I was out like a light.

Well, until that stupid blood pressure cuff kept slipping off and triggering an alarm that sent nurses sprinting in like it was a goddamn Code Red. Especially when my bladder (which is the size of a dwarven gerbil) was full and I needed to go visit the facilities.

This is a representation of my bladder… a little dwarven gerbil gallantly racing into battle on a…snail.

Imagine being tangled in wires, hooked to an IV, and trying to shuffle to the toilet in a backless gown that ensured the entire medical staff got a preview of my moonrise over Austin (but hey at least it’s a cute moon, I have been told by many people… well, ok, only by Dr. Wife… that I have a cute caboose back there).

I felt like Canoe Reeves as Neo in the Matrix with all those wires hooked up to me.

Aorta Get Up for This

You know that classic movie scene where the camera blinks awake, everything is blurry, and then—BAM—someone’s face is way too close?

So that happened.

I woke up to a very tall, very loud doctor inches from my nose.

"GOOD MORNING, MR. THIGPEN! HOW ARE YOU?"

"I—"

"WELL, I DON’T WANT TO ALARM YOU, BUT YOU HAD A HEART ATTACK, AND WE NEED TO PUT A STENT IN ASAP!"

Oh. Cool. So just casual Tuesday stuff then.

About That Anesthesia… No? Okay…

I had no idea what a stent procedure entailed, but I was already nodding because—whatever, just knock me out and do your thing.

"OH, WE CAN’T KNOCK YOU OUT. YOU HAVE TO BE LUCID FOR THE PROCEDURE."

…Excuse me, what?

"OH YEAH. AND WE’LL MOST LIKELY HAVE TO GO IN THROUGH… YOUR GROIN!"

This is an exact diagram of a stent going through my groin. I originally had a photo of me here, showing the same thing, but Dr. Wife (who is the editor) promptly took it down and put me in time out, in a box, deep in a dark cavern, with 30 black widows and a rabid badger who’d not eaten in 3 weeks. So this animation will have to suffice.

With this knowledge that the tall, very loud doctor was going to be sticking a needle near my special bits, my telemetry machine clocked my heart rate at speeds of… “Hummingbird on Meth,” which, I’m pretty sure, is how people explode into a fine red mist.

This hummingbird breaking the sound barrier is an exact replica of my blood pressure at the moment they told me they were sticking a metal slinky near my peen.

The HORror of Babylon

So they wheeled me into the Heart Operating Room (HOR), where multiple medical HOR professionals prepared to thread a tiny metal slinky into my heart while I was there lying in the HOR.

(I’m skipping over the “prep” part entirely because I do have a shred of dignity. A single, very fine, bedraggled shred.)

The aftermath of what I looked like when the HOR nurse got ahold of me with the razor. See below for said nurse.

I was mentally preparing for the worst in my groin area, when the HOR anesthesiologist chimed in:

"Good news! We’re going through your wrist instead! That’s how us HOR docs like to do that kinda thang!”

…Oh. Cool. So, less medical HORror movie and more like HORrornary nightmares?

In the HOR, the HOR doctor hooked me up to an iv of Versed—which felt like if morphine and anesthesia had a HOR love child. I was aware of everything happening, but I did not care at all while I was lying there inside the HOR where things were soft and warm and…

:: The rest of this paragraph has been removed by Dr. Wife for reasons ::

Let’s just say after this little “stent” I had…patches in my fur.

A Wire, A Stent, and more HOR time

I could feel the wire snake through my arm, slither across my chest, and push into my heart. The HOR doc counted down:

"Okay, we’re inserting the stent in 3…2…"

And then—BAM.

It felt like someone unclogged your stopped toilet that your bff’s dumbass boyfriend clogged up during the Super Bowl half time where Kendrick castrated Drake.

Suddenly, blood flowed freely through my Right Coronoary Artery again, and for the first time in what felt like forever, I could just breathe. Like, really breathe. Not like being stuck in the HOR and “sucking a marble through a straw” breathing anymore.

Here is a 4 minute video of my heart and them jabbing a stent up in there. Enjoy. :)

Silent but Violent

If you’ve picked up on the fact that I’ve not talked about clutching my chest, doing an award winning performance of a man painfully dying of a heart attack like you see in the movies, you are correct. They don’t call heart attacks “silent killers” for nothing. For me, I didn’t have this massive heart attack where I fell on the floor in pain, gasping for air and clutching my heart. Nope, I didn’t even think I was having a heart attack until hours later when the doc told me.

Heart attacks are often called "the silent killer", but the term is more commonly associated with silent heart attacks (silent myocardial infarctions, or SMIs not to be confused with STIs). Here’s why:

Lack of Symptoms or Subtle Symptoms – Many peeps experience a heart attack without the classic chest-clutching, Hollywood-style pain (like me!). Instead, symptoms can be mild, mistaken for indigestion, fatigue, or muscle pain. Some people don’t feel symptoms at all (also like me, I really thought I’d hurt my shoulder and didn’t even consider a heart attack).
Delayed Diagnosis – Because the warning signs can be vague (like shortness of breath, mild discomfort, nausea or fatigue), people don’t always seek medical help in time (like me!). They might only find out later, during a routine check-up or after another cardiac event.
Hidden Damage – Even if a person doesn’t realize they had a heart attack, the damage to the heart is still happening. Over time, this can lead to heart failure, arrhythmias, or another, more severe heart attack. After my infarction, I had some scarring on my heart. For a year afterwards, I’d have this searing pain race over my heart and it’d freak me the hell out every time.
Risk Factors Often Go Unnoticed – High blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes can contribute to heart attacks without obvious symptoms. Someone can feel fine while underlying damage accumulates; just from my own assumptions (not facts or data), I believe that’s what was happening to me. My guess is that I’d been dealing with heart stuff for a while but was getting by well enough to not notice anything.
Higher Mortality (Death) Due to Lack of Immediate Treatment – When people don’t realize they’re having a heart attack, they don’t get to the hospital quickly. The longer a blockage remains untreated, the greater the risk of fatal outcomes. Which is what I did… I waited, and I don’t recommend it. I hate the ER as well as I hate hospitals, but go, damn it.
Don’t Fuck Around and Find out - Don’t let fear, pride or ego keep you from being aware of your heart. Be as educated as you can by listening to your doctors (not TikTok), medical professionals (not Facebook) and read factual material that could save your life (from the American Heart Association, not an influencer from YouTuber named “mRNAhole” who has 100k subs where 99,999 of them are paid-for bots).

🫀Ask Me Anything🫀

Before I had a heart attack, I feared the unknown. Now I am more knowledgeable because of Dr. Wife; also, a lot of her colleagues, who are now my friends, are physicians who give a shit about your wellbeing. So if you have a question, feel free to reach out in the comments below, or my DMs are generally always open!

Next week is the final chapter of my heart attack journey; obviously I’m still alive so it’s all good news from here. (It better be. - Dr. Wife)

See you next week for the final chapter of My Unfortunate Infarction.

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