Healthy?

I underwent a stress test today...sounds like an exam to reveal how much I know about stress. Well, I think I know a lot! Naturally, this stress test was undertaken after a winter of lethargy, laziness, and generally slothful behavior on my part. No exercise, a habit of regular and massive overeating, far too much liquor, etc., etc. That was my winter. And then, today, I was put on a treadmill to test my heart's functioning. Crap! It didn't function well at all! I was sweating like a stuck pig by the time my heart rate got to the required 142 beats per minute, which occurred after 8 minutes on the treadmill. That was after the speed and degree of incline of the treadmill was adjusted upward, radically, twice. I felt very much like I was running at top speed on a very steep mountain ridge, nearing the top. The atmosphere there among the clouds and bitter cold and snow held a fraction of the oxygen it holds here, close to sea level. Awful!

After my torture session ended, I started coughing, due to a post nasal drip that was exacerbated by the exercise. My sinuses started filling with...wet cement, it seemed...and I felt like I had just inhaled a piece of dust that decided to land at just the wrong place. I coughed, and coughed, and coughed, and coughed for at least 15 minutes. There was phlegm stuck in my airway at just the wrong spot...it was enough to drive me insane! Anyway, I finally stopped...but it has happened off and on, though not nearly as severely, ever since. I did the second round of laying motionless on a table as I was "photographed" by a machine that slipped by, very slowly, my body over a 15 minute period, taking "pictures" every 30-45 seconds. When it was all done, the technician told me everything looked good. A relief! Last time, the same guy told me it looked very, very bad! The doctor later told me it was perfect.

I hate dealing with medical tests and related "stuff." I want to be astonishingly healthy for a 25 year-old (and I'm 52), and I want that state put on permanent hold.