Grandmother, 63: “The ICU Nurse Called Me One Of The Lucky Ones.” What Happened After My Flight, And What I Do Every Time I Fly Now

"She was one of the lucky ones." That was me.

If your ankles swell when you fly...

If you've ever woken up the morning after a flight with one leg that just didn't feel right...

If you've been told it's just part of getting older...

Please read this before your next flight.

You may have read the story of Diane, the ICU nurse who finally broke her silence about what she's seen happen to women over 50 after they fly.

In it, she mentions a 63 year old grandmother from Nashville. Active. Healthy. Traveled twice a year to see her grandchildren. A clot in her left leg that they caught before it moved.

"She was one of the lucky ones," Diane wrote. That grandmother was me.

The Flight I Thought Was Like Every Other

My name is Carol. I'm 63, I'm a retired school librarian, and I fly twice a year to see my daughter and my granddaughter.

I walk every morning. I've never missed a checkup. My doctor had looked at my legs, listened to my heart, and told me I was in great shape for my age.

It was a four hour flight, like always. My ankles swelled, like always. I worked my shoes back on at landing, like always, and laughed about it with my daughter at baggage claim.

The next morning I woke up in her guest room and my left calf ached. Not a cramp. A deep, dull ache, and when I pressed on it, it felt warm. It looked a little bigger than my right one.

I told myself I'd slept on it wrong. I was going to take a couple of ibuprofen and go to the park with my granddaughter.

My daughter took one look at my leg and drove me to the emergency room instead.

The ultrasound found a clot in the deep vein of my left calf. It had formed while I sat on that plane.

What The Nurse Told Me At 2am

They admitted me that night. Around 2am, the nurse came in, pulled a chair up beside my bed, and sat with me.

That was Diane.

She asked me how I was feeling. Then she told me, very gently, that a few weeks earlier she'd lost a woman about my age. Same kind of flight. Same clean chart. That woman's clot broke loose when she stood up in the aisle and traveled to her lungs.

"Yours didn't move," she said. "You're one of the lucky ones."

I didn't feel lucky. I felt like I'd done everything right and my own body had nearly killed me anyway.

So I asked her the question I couldn't stop thinking about. How does a healthy woman who walks every morning get a blood clot from sitting in a plane?

What She Explained About My Veins

Inside the veins of your legs are tiny one way valves, she told me. They open to let blood climb back toward your heart, then close so it can't slide back down. Estrogen helped keep those vein walls flexible.

After menopause, the walls stiffen and the valves seal a little less tightly. Blood slows down and starts to pool in the lower legs. Quietly. In women with clean bloodwork and normal checkups.

Then she asked me if my ankles had been swelling more in the last few years. If my legs felt heavier by evening. If I'd noticed small veins on my calves that weren't there before.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

"Those aren't signs of getting older," she said. "Those are signs your veins were already struggling. The flight just finished the job."

What Four Hours In That Seat Did To My Legs

The cabin is pressurized to roughly the air at 8,000 feet. Humidity often sits between 10 and 20 percent, drier than most deserts, so you lose water without feeling thirsty and your blood gets thicker. Your calf muscles, the pump that pushes blood back up your legs with every step, go quiet the moment you sit down. And the seat presses on the vein behind your knee for hours.

Blood that sits still in the deep veins of your calf can clump into a clot. Doctors call it deep vein thrombosis. Often there's no pain at all until later, and nothing you can see.

"The dangerous part is what comes next," Diane said. "When you stand up, or in the days after, a clot can break loose and travel to the lungs. That's a pulmonary embolism. That's what happened to the woman I lost."

The World Health Organization's research on air travel found the risk of a blood clot roughly doubles on flights longer than four hours. And over 100,000 Americans die from pulmonary embolism every year. That's more than breast cancer.

Everything I Thought I Was Doing Right

Lying in that hospital bed, I went through it all in my head. I'd done every single thing I'd ever been told to do.

• I drank water the whole flight. It helps a little with thick blood. It does nothing for a calf pump that's switched off.
• I walked the aisle when I could. It works while you're walking. Sit back down and the pooling starts again within minutes. And the seatbelt sign was on for half that flight.
• I put my feet up when I landed. By then I'd already spent hours with blood sitting in my lower legs.
• I even owned pharmacy compression socks. They were in my carry on. Thick, hot nylon that dug into my calves, so I'd stopped wearing them years ago. A sock in your bag protects nothing.

When I told Diane about the socks in my carry on, she smiled for the first time that night.

What Diane Saw On The Jet Bridge

She told me she'd given up on compression socks too. Twenty years of watching patients refuse to wear them.

Then on a flight to see her sister, she'd watched the flight attendants walk off a four hour flight like they'd had a full night's sleep. One of them was older than her. Diane caught her past the jet bridge and asked what her secret was.

The woman lifted her trouser leg and showed her a soft grey bamboo sock. Knee high. Sleek. Then the three crew members with her did the same. Same sock.

"Evina," Diane said. "They're the only ones I've worn that I never wanted to take off. And they're the only ones I'd trust on a woman like you."

Why These Were Different

My daughter looked them up on her phone right there in my hospital room. The first thing that stopped us was how they explained the problem. Most women don't quit compression because compression doesn't work. They quit because the sock is unbearable. That was me exactly.

Evina was built to fix that.

• Graduated compression rated at 15 to 20 mmHg. Firmest at the ankle where blood pools first, easing off up the calf. It does the job your calf muscle would do if you were walking, while you sit completely still.
• Cushioned heel and ball of the foot for the long walk through the terminal and every step off the jet bridge.
• 28 micro massage points woven into the knit.
• Soft bamboo viscose that stays cool at altitude, so you don't overheat or itch.
• A non pinch top band that holds without leaving the red ring my pharmacy pair always left on my calves.

I ordered them that night.

Flying Again

I'll be honest. After that, I was scared to get back on a plane.

Before my next trip, I went over everything with my own doctor and made a plan with her, including wearing compression every time I fly. If you've ever had a clot, please do the same before you travel.

The first time I put the Evina socks on, I kept waiting for the squeeze I remembered from the pharmacy pair. It never came. They slid on, soft and cool, and I forgot I had them on before I'd even finished my coffee.

That Christmas I put them on at home, before I left for the airport. Same four hour flight. Same seat. Same dry air.

When we landed, I stood up and my legs felt like my legs. My shoes fit the same way they had when I boarded. And the next morning, I woke up and checked my left calf the way I do every time now.

Nothing. No ache. No warmth. Just my leg.

My granddaughter came running at me in arrivals with my daughter right behind her holding a welcome sign, and I knelt down and caught her. That afternoon we went to the park I'd missed the last time.

Lucky Shouldn't Be The Plan

I think about the woman Diane lost almost every time I fly. Same age as me. Same kind of flight. The only difference between her story and mine is that her clot moved and mine didn't.

Diane called me one of the lucky ones. I've thought about that word a lot since. Lucky shouldn't be the plan.

If you fly even once a year, if your ankles swell when you land, if you've been telling yourself it's just part of getting older, please don't wait until you're lying in a hospital bed to do something about it.

Right now, Evina is offering 60% off for readers of this article.

They make them in small batches, and when a batch sells through, the offer closes. Diane's sister had to try three times before she finally got hers.

P.S. Since that night, I've told every woman I know who flies, starting with my book club. Here's what some of them, and other Evina customers, have said:

Click the button above to see if Evina is still offering 60% off.