On June 9th I had 6 separate attacks/spells/episodes that seemed like heart attacks, but I didn't have some of the classic heart attack symptoms and my heart is in great shape so I decided to wait and see what happened next.
With each attack I got very dizzy, lost my hearing and saw large black spots, had a terrible pain over my heart that got worse when I breathed, and I had a very sharp, very severe pain in my lower back that came and went with each heartbeat. These attacks lasted about a minute each. The first four occurred when I was sitting at my desk in the air conditioning so I knew they weren't heat related.
I decided to wait and see what happened that night and call my doctor in the morning for an appointment. Everyone was telling me to go to the emergency room but I didn't want to spend my birthday in a waiting room. So, the following morning I called my doctor. When I described what had happened she told me to hang up and call 911. So much for avoiding the emergency room...
I was in the ER for about 3 hours. I was given an IV and hooked to an EKG. I was given Toradol through my IV. After beeing on the EKG for a while I was taken for a series of chest x-rays. The doctors determined I have pleurisey, which is an inflamation of the lining of the chest cavity. I had a sinus infection a few weeks ago that returned after a course of antibiotics and apparently it infected my chest cavity. There is fluid built up around my heart and it causes pain because my heart cannot fully expand when it beats.
I have been given bed rest for the rest of the week and oxaprozin, a non-sterol anti-inflamatory drug, for the pain in my heart and to reduce the fluid build up in my chest cavity. I begin to get dizzy after I take a few deep breaths and I get fatigued after simply walking up the stairs so I will not be able to go on my planned backpacking trip this weekend. That sucks.
Just last week I was in the gym four times training my legs, back, and shoulders for the trip and now I couldn't even walk from the parking lot into the gym without getting tired and dizzy. Being a single parent I don't get to get into the woods very often and I hate missing this opportunity to get away for four days. I had thought about driving Skyline Drive through Shenandoah on my way home but that would just be torture to me since I wouldn't be able to get out and hike any of the short circuits to the scenic viewpoints and waterfalls. I'll just have to keep my eyes open for my next opportunity to hit the trails and get healthy between now and then.
