Thanks to those who offered prayers for me and my family recently. I hope I am back to "normal" at this point although I no longer know what "normal" is.
I started having the symptoms of trouble a couple of days before the actual event, with discomfort coming and going. My problem is I have a general high tolerance for pain across the board, so I didn't read this as a heart attack. I've heard all about the crushing pain, the elephant sitting on my chest, etc. I got none of that. I got some squeezing around my chest but it felt like back spasms. Mostly, I was just plain uncomfortable.
But I woke up at 5:30 Wednesday a.m. with a more pronounced discomfort. I told my wife I was going to go lie down in our guest bedroom and cut the ceiling fan on high. I still wasn't sure whether I was experiencing a heart problem or acid reflux (although I've never had that before) or what.
Within about 20 seconds of lying down, my head started spinning and I got the feeling like I just walked into a crowded room with no pants on -- not a panic attack, but a real big "oh-crap" feeling. I stood up and went blind for about 5 seconds. I ended up steadying myself in a doorway and calling my wife in. The longer I stood, the better I felt. Within about 5-10 minutes, I had improved to simply feeling lousy. I had client appointments stacked up through the a.m., so I went into work.
At about lunch, I came home, sat on the couch for about an hour and, realizing things weren't getting better, asked my wife to take me into the ER. I used to work in an ER, and I abhor people who game the ER system, so when they asked me how bad my pain was, I was honest -- I told them 6-7 on a scale of 1-10. That bought me another 2 hours in a waiting room. Next time I'll say "10-plus" and go with it.
The first ER doc that saw us didn't think I was having an attack, either, until the cardiac enzymes came back elevated. From there it only took me about 20 minutes to get all the way into the cath lab. Thanks to a family history of having a problem with anesthesia, I had to do the cath without any, save for local at the arterial injection site and one shot of morphine that seemed to wear off pretty quickly, but I'll say this: To anyone scared to get a cath for pain reasons, don't be scared, as I've hurt worse from a sunburn than this.
My entire LAD was blocked at a major junction, meaning probably the bottom left quarter of my heart had been without blood supply for 12-15 hours. Surprisingly, my bloodwork wasn't that bad. I don't smoke, drink heavily or do drugs. Even though I need to lose weight, my cholesterol wasn't much above 200 and there were no other issues.
I was stumping my cardio team until I mentioned I snored a great deal, and always had (my dad did, too, despite being very fit), and after two nights' observation, it looks like the trigger was sleep apnea plus general stress (I am about three years into a career change). My O2 levels were dropping off in the 60s during sleep, which caused my blood pressure to skyrocket and stressed the heart.
My advice, therefore, is if you snore, get a sleep study. I will have to change my diet somewhat I'm sure, and I've got a nice collection of pills in the next room, but I feel better now than I have in 5-10 years and within the next month I will probably have a CPAP if I can tolerate it. I would also be badly remiss if I didn't praise the cardio team at Baptist South in Montgomery and everyone else associated with my care.
Glad to be back.
Jess
I started having the symptoms of trouble a couple of days before the actual event, with discomfort coming and going. My problem is I have a general high tolerance for pain across the board, so I didn't read this as a heart attack. I've heard all about the crushing pain, the elephant sitting on my chest, etc. I got none of that. I got some squeezing around my chest but it felt like back spasms. Mostly, I was just plain uncomfortable.
But I woke up at 5:30 Wednesday a.m. with a more pronounced discomfort. I told my wife I was going to go lie down in our guest bedroom and cut the ceiling fan on high. I still wasn't sure whether I was experiencing a heart problem or acid reflux (although I've never had that before) or what.
Within about 20 seconds of lying down, my head started spinning and I got the feeling like I just walked into a crowded room with no pants on -- not a panic attack, but a real big "oh-crap" feeling. I stood up and went blind for about 5 seconds. I ended up steadying myself in a doorway and calling my wife in. The longer I stood, the better I felt. Within about 5-10 minutes, I had improved to simply feeling lousy. I had client appointments stacked up through the a.m., so I went into work.
At about lunch, I came home, sat on the couch for about an hour and, realizing things weren't getting better, asked my wife to take me into the ER. I used to work in an ER, and I abhor people who game the ER system, so when they asked me how bad my pain was, I was honest -- I told them 6-7 on a scale of 1-10. That bought me another 2 hours in a waiting room. Next time I'll say "10-plus" and go with it.
The first ER doc that saw us didn't think I was having an attack, either, until the cardiac enzymes came back elevated. From there it only took me about 20 minutes to get all the way into the cath lab. Thanks to a family history of having a problem with anesthesia, I had to do the cath without any, save for local at the arterial injection site and one shot of morphine that seemed to wear off pretty quickly, but I'll say this: To anyone scared to get a cath for pain reasons, don't be scared, as I've hurt worse from a sunburn than this.
My entire LAD was blocked at a major junction, meaning probably the bottom left quarter of my heart had been without blood supply for 12-15 hours. Surprisingly, my bloodwork wasn't that bad. I don't smoke, drink heavily or do drugs. Even though I need to lose weight, my cholesterol wasn't much above 200 and there were no other issues.
I was stumping my cardio team until I mentioned I snored a great deal, and always had (my dad did, too, despite being very fit), and after two nights' observation, it looks like the trigger was sleep apnea plus general stress (I am about three years into a career change). My O2 levels were dropping off in the 60s during sleep, which caused my blood pressure to skyrocket and stressed the heart.
My advice, therefore, is if you snore, get a sleep study. I will have to change my diet somewhat I'm sure, and I've got a nice collection of pills in the next room, but I feel better now than I have in 5-10 years and within the next month I will probably have a CPAP if I can tolerate it. I would also be badly remiss if I didn't praise the cardio team at Baptist South in Montgomery and everyone else associated with my care.
Glad to be back.
Jess
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