Update on Fisher

[Pat5775]

In May of 2016, I spent 2 weeks in the hospital with a staph infection in my blood. Specifically staph aureus endocarditis. It came on as flu-like symptoms and I spent the first couple days in bed thinking nothing if it. It's just the flu, why bother with doctors? I woke up in the hospital 2 days after passing out in my apartment (thank god my gf broke in and found me in time). Turns out the infection was destroying my mitral heart valve. I spent 6 additional weeks at home with a PICC line receiving antibiotics. To this day, I have "mitral valve regurgitation", damage to the valve causing a backflow of blood. It sounds serious and it certainly can be. This gives me an irregular heartbeat. I asked the cardiologist, hypothetically, if I was a professional athlete would I have to retire? He said he would highly recommend anybody with a heart issue like this retire and focus on staying healthy. 

For the most part, I can live a normal life. I still exercise 5 days a week and have no dietary restrictions (yet), but every now and then I'll randomly lose my breath and experience a few seconds of horror. Headaches are a common issue with me and some days I'm so tired it feels like a chore to walk to the bathroom. 

Hopefully whatever Jake has isn't nearly as scary but I sincerely hope he and the team don't take this lightly. Football should not be a concern of his if the procedure doesn't fix the issue 100%.

Best wishes, Jake. Get well soon and be thankful this was discovered before things got too serious.