I've Never Had a Ride in the Ambulance Before!

So this is for my Grandpa. He is just dying to know the details of my hospital visit.

Last week, I had gone out for my normal jog (about 1.5 miles). Nothing too strenuous, just to get the blood moving. When I returned home, I walked into the gate of our complex and I felt a little pain in my chest. Almost like an air bubble trapped in my throat. So I coughed and kind of hit my chest to see if I could just get rid of it. By the time I got up to the 3rd Floor where our condo is, the pain had increased so severely that I could hardly breathe. It felt as though I had swallowed a large stone and it was just caught in my esophagus. This made it so I couldn't swallow and even breathing brought a sharp pain to my chest. I stumbled into the house and went straight to the bathroom for some reason. Sat on the floor and tried to figure out what was going on.

I have had a reaction like this once before, when I found out I was allergic to feta cheese. I would eat the cheese and shortly after, it felt like my chest was completely closing in on me. As if my throat was swollen shut. But this time the pain was much sharper and I sat there clutching my chest. I tried to make myself throw up to relieve some of the pressure but couldn't. So my next reaction was to call my husband.

He was at work talking to his bosses and got the terrifying phone call of "I'M HAVING REALLY BAD CHEST PAINS! I CAN'T BREATHE OR SWALLOW!" It totally freaked him out and he instructed me to call 911 and immediately left work (which is about 30 miles away from home). So I called 911 and the dispatcher told me to stay seated and put my head back to open up my airways. That did seem to help as I waited for the paramedics. Within 5 minutes, I had 4 (very handsome) paramedics and 3 (very good-looking) firemen in my house. They asked me to move to the living room and began a process of checking my blood pressure, heart, pulse, lungs, etc. Everything looked completely normal, but I still had the pain. On a scale of 1 to 10, it was probably an 8 or 9. So the paramedics thought since it wasn't a heart attack that I was probably having anxiety. But I don't have anxiety. So there was no real answer and they recommended that I go to the hospital.

Coming from a family of cheap-skates, all I could think about was how expensive the ambulance ride would be. But since my husband was still about 20 minutes away, I decided it would be best to just take it and get to the hospital as quickly as possible. While in the ambulance, they gave me chewable aspirin for the pain and nitro glycerin to slow down my heart rate. By the time we reached the hospital, my pain was down to about a 4 or 5. In the hospital room, they took blood/did an EKG/checked my heart rate/ blood pressure/lungs again. We had to wait about 30 minutes for the results but everything was totally fine and normal. The doctor said "You know, we get about 5 heart attacks a day, but they are not 30-year olds. They are older, obese people with high blood pressure and health problems." I couldn't help but think "Brittney Murphy was only 32!!" but I also knew I wasn't in the same category as her.

By this time, my husband and Mother-In-Law had arrived and I was feeling much better. My pain was at about a 2 or 3 and I was starting to feel more embarrassed than anything! It was all such a fuss for nothing! When the doctor came in to release me, he assured me that it wasn't my heart and I said "I know that! The pain is not where my heart is. It's where my esophagus is." So his educated guess was that I had severe acid reflux of some sort. I asked "REALLY?!! Acid reflux can cause that sort of pain?" He said that occasionally it could and also gave me some literature on Gastritis and Ulcers, along with a prescription for a Prilosec-type of medicine. And home I went.

I'm still not convinced that it was any of the things he mentioned. I have no other symptoms to indicate Acid Reflux, Gastritis or Ulcers. So my self-diagnosis is that it was a severe allergic reaction of some sort. I had eaten an omelet earlier that day with cheese and milk, so I am betting one of those dairy products got the best of me. Hopefully there is no next time, but if there is I'm going to try using my Epi-pen to see if that relieves the symptoms.

All in all, I'm totally fine. I start jogging again today (I have to, after all the holiday treats I ate!) and the one good thing that came from all of this is now I have an interesting story to tell my Grandpa! Love you Gramps!