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.I didn’t break out in a cold sweat or get short of breath, and 2) oddly for someone as neurotic as me, the pain didn’t frighten me probably because I still had cars to cut off and errands to run.
....Why wasn’t I scared? Because I’m a male, and men, especially men in middle age, are notorious for thinking that nothing serious will ever happen to them. Until it does happen, of course), which is why I quickly diagnosed my pain to be esophageal spasm from my recurrent and persistent acid reflux, and even if that diagnosis was wrong, I reassured myself, the pain couldn’t possibly be cardiac in origin since I’m very fit and (with the exception of a high LDL level for which I receive treatment), I’d never had even a hint of cardiac problems.
....So despite what I’m always telling you to do, I didn’t stop the car and call 911, and even more shamefully, I didn’t drive myself the 5 or so blocks I was from that great emergency department in St. Paul’s Hospital. No, like the idiot I now admit I am, I kept going about my business, even though the pain persisted for several hours (albeit in a modified intensity).
....Later in the day, though, when I told my wife about my “little |
....This article is about what to do when you get chest pain that you think may be the sign of a heart attack, but sheepishly, I have to kick it off with an embarrassing confession, namely, that I can be an awful idiot sometimes (and please no chorus of “We know, we know” because I get an overabundance of that kind of stuff at home).
....Why the confession about being an idiot in an article about chest pain? |
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tBecause even though I’ve spent countless hours advising you, my dear readers, listeners, and viewers about what to do if you think you might be having a heart attack, when I had to consider that possibility in myself, I did none of the things I tell you to do, although happily, I lived to tell the tale with no damage to my heart.
....This story starts a couple of years ago while I was driving over the Burrard Street Bridge in Vancouver in my usual careful and controlled manner. Actually, if I’m going to be completely honest throughout this piece, I must admit that I was driving like a maniac (yes, I’m one of those guys who cuts you off if you’re going too slow for my liking, and all of you are always, of course, going too slow for my liking). Anyway, as I got to the middle of the bridge and just as I was considering cutting sharply into the lane beside me, I developed a sudden, intense “crushing” pain behind my breastbone (or sternum), a pain I could not clear or even ameliorate by burping or by breathing slowly, both of which I attempted to do as I rushed into the inside lane and continued weaving over the bridge.
....The thought that this pain might be signaling a heart attack did enter my mind immediately, of course, but I instantly dismissed the idea because 1) |
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