When You Run Out of Mondays

A personal account of two pulmonary emboli, one word that never fully fit, and the conversation that came after.

For months, I felt off — fatigued, flu-like, and winded climbing stairs. Groceries felt heavier than they ever should have been. I dismissed it with a familiar promise: “Come Monday, I’ll eat better. I’ll move more.”

In the early morning hours of May 2016, my body stopped negotiating. I woke to my heart pounding violently, as if trying to escape my chest. I told myself it was anxiety and tried to walk it off, but each step made breathing harder.

I turned to my husband and whispered: “We need to go to the ER. I think I’m having a heart attack.”

November 2020: The second event. The moment everything shifted.

2016 — 2017 The Word Unprovoked

A label that never fully fit.

For a year, I followed instructions: Warfarin monitoring, genetic testing, and a review of every standard risk factor. There was no recent travel, no surgery, and no estrogen. Despite my family history, my bloodwork showed no inherited thrombophilia.

Eventually, my pulmonary embolism was labeled “unprovoked,” but that word never fully fit. While I hadn’t had surgery or taken hormones, I had been living with obesity, sedentary habits, chronic stress, and poor sleep.

All of these are recognized contributors to cardiovascular and venous thromboembolism risk. Clots are often categorized by acute triggers, but vascular health is shaped over years.

Val Conley, blood clot survivor after EKOS treatment — After EKOS™ catheter-directed therapy. May 2016.

Hospital IV line for PE treatment — The reality of life on a heparin drip.

Val Conley walking the hospital halls — Learning to breathe — and trust my body again.

Medicine is powerful.
It is not omniscient.

Val Conley — Blood Clot Survivor & Founder of Speaking of Blood Clots

2020 — Present Living Forward

Stopping the wait for Mondays.

Today, I’m in a long-term relationship with apixaban, and anticoagulation is part of my life. So is chronic venous insufficiency — a quiet reminder that clots leave lasting marks. But something changed after the second event: I stopped waiting for Mondays.

I began rebuilding habits — slowly, imperfectly, consistently. Movement became non-negotiable, sleep became protected, and nutrition became intentional. Over time, my relationship with my body shifted from reactive to proactive.

Living through two pulmonary emboli changed how I show up in my care. I am not someone replacing medicine, but someone participating in it.

The Larger Picture Why This Conversation Matters

The warning signs were cumulative. Not sudden.

Venous thromboembolism is the third most common cardiovascular event after heart attack and stroke. When clots are discussed, the focus often narrows to anticoagulation and genetics. Those matter, but so do the metabolic and lifestyle patterns that shape vascular health over decades.

I cannot prove lifestyle caused my clots, but I know the warning signs were cumulative, not sudden. This conversation is personal because the consequences were personal. I don’t want other women discovering that only after they run out of Mondays.

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