"Clutch Your Chest and Fall to the Ground" Part 1

It was Saturday night. Alarm bells rang. Horns blasted. Lights flashed. I clutched my chest and fell to the floor screaming, carpet burn instantly burst into flame on my right forearm and cheek. My eyes closed and there it was – a time-lapsed video that was my life. It played out longer than I expected for a mere 42 years. (I guess no one ever said I was boring.) So this was it. This was how it was all going to end. I was a total cliché - death by heart attack from 32 years of type 1 diabetes.

Actually, that’s not how it happened at all.

You see, I am a curious human specimen, the word “typical” impossible to apply to my diseased body. (Okay and maybe my whole quirky self. Never mind that.)

Yes, I did end up in the emergency department of the largest hospital in the area due to symptoms of a possible heart attack. It just didn’t happen how one would expect.

It all began mid-evening with an indescribable localized headache. (Wait. I’m a writer. Challenge accepted. Let me try and paint you a picture. It’ll be fun.)

I suffer from stress headaches, eye strain headaches, hypoglycemic headaches, hyperglycemic headaches and puking migraines. This was not any of those. Picture in your mind, a glass ramekin. (Ooo! Creme Brulee! Yes please!)  Now, eat that crème brulee. (Or feed a friend. Just please don’t throw it away!) Now fill the ramekin with tnt. (Not the song, TNT by ACDC. Actual tnt.) Pack it in tight, place it under your skull northwest of your left eyeball facedown with the open end resting against your brain, and then watch it explode. I’ll tell you what happens next. With nowhere to go, the wreckage swells and smokes. Tears and nausea join the attack as if somehow this will relieve the pressure.

Puke. Sob. Lie down. Try to breathe. Sob. Breathe some more.

25 minutes and two cold compresses later the headache settles into acceptable proportions and I get up.

Okay, so what the heck was that?

Puttering around the kitchen in my dressing gown, I am thankful the worst is over.

Suddenly my hand flies to the front of my neck as a shallow knife slices upwards. There it is again. And again. I’ll be honest...this does not feel quite right.

I sit.

Okay. So my neck is calming down. I’m fine.

Wait.

Why is my left shoulder aching? Oh wow. It is really aching. And there goes my whole left arm. As tears flow, I scoff at the word “agony.” It is but a weak child cowering under the torturous monster that has consummed my left side. Why is there a sharp tingle shooting up my back?

Wait.

Okay. That’s gone.

But breathing just got difficult. Did I run up a three mile, 10% grade hill in the last two minutes? No. I just stood up and walked a few steps.

And...

There it is. My chest is tight. And is that a strange twinge of pain rippling across? It’s not terrible though. My arm hurts worse than my chest. And my head is much better. The knife at my neck is gone. As I silently try to process what might be happening, Don’s voice breaks through my thoughts.

 “So, you know you are having all the symptoms of a heart attack, right?”

“How do you know?”

“I just looked it up on the internet.”

“Oh. Okay. But heart attacks don’t usually start with a headache, do they?”

“It didn’t mention a headache, but you do know you are not normal, right?”

Good point.

You may be questioning why the next words I type aren’t, so we went to the hospital. Judge if you must, but if I went to the hospital every time I had a new or weird and whacky symptom, they would probably charge me rent. And you have no idea how exhausting it is to try to explain me, to a doctor who knows nothing of my situation or history, only to be sent home 10 or 14 hours later with no diagnosis. Plus, my symptoms were happening in a sequence rather than all at once, so this was not a simple case of, so we went to the hospital.

Some time goes by while I play ping pong in my head, the opponents being Stay or Go.

Soon though, everything but my arm and shoulder (okay and my chest a little and maybe my back so mostly everything) are feeling much better. Crisis averted, right?

As I sit in my bed, now approximately 2:45 a.m. doubt sets in. Am I okay? Should I have gone in? But it must be too late now, right? Then Google explained there is a blood test that can determine whether a cardiac incident has occurred or not. Hmm...Should I be going to get this test? The episode was over (?) but maybe I should find out if any damage had been done to my heart? I hear Demi Lovato's song,  Heart Attack on repeat, deep in my brain.

Cue FB messenger.

My dear cousin and friend is an emergency room nurse back in the largest hospital in Winnipeg.

You there?

She was. After a lengthy discussion (and her giving me heck for not going sooner) she convinces me it probably wise to still go in and get the test, despite my symptoms now almost totally gone.

People with diabetes don’t always present heart attacks like other people. They can even have silent (painless) heart attacks, so this could definitely have been one. Do whatever you have to do. Clutch your chest and throw yourself on the ground if you have to.

Fine.

“Honey, I think we better go in after all.”