![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
the world's first completely self-contained artificial heart
I dreamed I had surgery and got one of those AbioCor artificial hearts that are back on the market now. Yes, I remembered the name in my dream. To keep it warm they put a tea light in my chest... and I couldn't figure out how often I had to check on the tealight, put in a new one and so forth. I couldn't figure out why they hadn't told me not to do handstands or anything like that (wouldn't that make it hard for the candle to keep going)? That was kind of confusing and anxiety-producing, especially because I had to cut myself to get at the tea light and I had no way of telling whether it had stopped burning.
I didn't have a heartbeat anymore because AbioCor is a continuous pump rather than a periodic one, and that was creepy (something I've read about in articles). I was thinking a lot about what it would be like if I were panicked and my muscles expected a flood of energy but my heart rate didn't change, or if I got really emotional but my heart didn't skip a beat. But I didn't really get upset until I remembered that nobody has managed to live with those hearts for more than a few months. Then I started crying on L-dawg, who happened to be around (though I was at work) and was trying to get one of the cats to cuddle with her.
L-dawg: are you okay?
Flexy, seeing Dan the Cat walking by: Um, I will be at 10:00 when the meeting starts, but it's not 10:00 yet. No, I'm not.
Alarm clock (playing Deep Forest): YA na na na na, na... na na na na!
Flexy: Wha, whoa? Ahhhhhhhhh, thank goodness.
I didn't have a heartbeat anymore because AbioCor is a continuous pump rather than a periodic one, and that was creepy (something I've read about in articles). I was thinking a lot about what it would be like if I were panicked and my muscles expected a flood of energy but my heart rate didn't change, or if I got really emotional but my heart didn't skip a beat. But I didn't really get upset until I remembered that nobody has managed to live with those hearts for more than a few months. Then I started crying on L-dawg, who happened to be around (though I was at work) and was trying to get one of the cats to cuddle with her.
L-dawg: are you okay?
Flexy, seeing Dan the Cat walking by: Um, I will be at 10:00 when the meeting starts, but it's not 10:00 yet. No, I'm not.
Alarm clock (playing Deep Forest): YA na na na na, na... na na na na!
Flexy: Wha, whoa? Ahhhhhhhhh, thank goodness.