Hey you! Yes you,.. my family, our friends, our valued Customikes enthusiast, and all kool fellow car fanatics… Yep You! =D

We do not talk a lot about this, but I will share my heart issue experience with you today….

I’m sitting at home chillin’/ writing after a 15 + hours in the ER and reflecting on me and my wife’s different view points on what I was experiencing…

Maybe this story will help you or someone you know one day… Please share if you feel right about this =D

To be clear, I did not experience chest pain.

I experienced chest pressure, discomfort and the feeling of impending doom on Monday night. My wife with 35+years in emergency services (paramedic, trauma nurse and EMS spec), automatically calls it “chest pain”, and so does almost all the EMS (Emergency Medical Services) and ER staff, that I dealt with in the last 24 hours. This, for me, leads to the core issue of what the EMS pro’s call “denial” around heart related emergencies… I’ll explain more in a bit and my wife even added her .02 cents to the end =D

Some background for you:
I had a relatively low activity life while working for an insurance carrier for 16 years. Some of the environmental challenges and organizational changes led to some stress and I was traveling 50-65 % of the time, eating a much too rich diet, alone in a hotels a lot…

Needless to say, I gained some weight and got myself some high blood pressure which was treated. Yes, I was told to lose some weight… (260#’s at the time)

I was rear ended badly in Dec 2014, was off work for 4.5 months from the injuries and the treatment/ recovery. Three weeks after returning to work, I was presented with a severance package and after some serious considerations, I accepted it in May of 2014.

Fast forward to 2015: 

We have a new health care insurance carrier. I could not use my old Dr. anymore so we signed up for a new one. I was running low on my BP meds (which were working fine). Unfortunately there was about two weeks that I did not have enough BP meds for before my first appointment. I figured “no biggie” as it was only a few weeks… Mistake for sure…

Proactively I’ve dropped some weight (now 230# on a 6’4″ frame) but the target from my old doctor was 200#. Biggest change was stopping with the Pepsi’s =0 Now if I have one, it’s a treat, and I rarely drink a full can. Eating more fish and discovered sushi. I’m thinking about veggies =D Yes I eat more veggies but likely not as much as I should. Love fruits, especially raspberries. I have intended to do some exercise but until now my honest efforts have been sporadic at best and mainly focused on core strength, to help my back. I have learned that doing it for my horse Prince, works the best, cause he loves our walks around the neighborhood.  They tend to be much longer with him too… Strange how we always give more to others than directly to ourselves =D

I digress… sorry!! Back to the point…

After laying on the couch for the entire weekend feeling like crap, blowing blood out of my nose and having headaches, my chest started to feel really strange.

Have I had some minor chest pressure earlier?  Yes, but nothing like this. Someone (relatively small) was standing on my chest. Yes I know, That’s part of my denial… =0 Either way it did not feel right and the later the day grew, so did this feeling. Eventually it fit the “Impending doom” “Something’s wrong” “this is not right” or “the someone” standing on my chest grew significantly in weight…

Considering my relatively “sedentary” lifestyle, getting short of breath is a relatively common thing when doing something. It does not really seem as a warning sign either, because by now I’m used to it… Yes I know, that’s part of my denial too,… Unfortunately, this also goes for light-headedness and feeling faint when doing something strenuous,… So it’s easy to deny when you’re sitting on a couch, because it is something familiar to you, not something new…

Yes I’m a proud 52-year-old, type A male, who rarely slows down until my body forces me to… Considering this, I’ve grown familiar with all the warning signs. What I did not think about is that they were present while I’d been on the couch for two days… Yes, now I know,… =D

Reflecting on making my EMS wife less than happy with my “denial” =0

She did it all right and talked me into going to an urgent care. Then proceeded to drive me to the ER,… Yes, it was the right thing to do. Yes, the denial in me did not want to go, but I did not fight her in the end =D

As she’s been in EMS all her life, she could not wait for me to explain my symptoms.  She walked right up to the ER window and proclaimed that I was having chest pain!! To be clear I did not have chest pain and I now (two days later) understand some of the frustration on both sides that could unfortunately lead to delayed care and possibly someone not getting the care that they need at the time that they need it.

The first thing out of my mouth when she did was: “I do not have chest pain!!!”… which was not met with a good response by anyone present. This took me aback a bit,… yet at this point I succumbed and became a “poster child chest pain victim” and everyone went into their “proper and likely well written procedures”

Unfortunately this barrage of events and the constant “how bad is your chest pain now”, “what would your rate your chest pain at” “chest pain this, chest pain that” continued for over 15 hours in the ER. Laying on my ER bed all hooked up, while everyone is frantically trying to figure out what is going on, I did have some time to reflect. I had not yet recovered from feeling railroaded by my wife, telling them I have something, that from my perspective, I clearly do not have.

Playing along and satisfying everyone is not feeling good, especially when they are projecting onto me something that I cannot honestly tell them I’m experiencing,… made me feel funny in ways, maybe even uncertain, that I was doing the wrong thing even being here. I mean, they clearly are looking for chest pain and I do not have it!.

I even reflected on my time as a firefighter/EMT in the early 90’s which is one of my wife’s favorite references. Like I should remember it as well as her life career in EMS,… =D

To reflect; I spent 5 years as a volunteer firefighter for three towns and a few years, part-time as an EMT, on two ambulance services. Yes, I have the basic training for heart related emergencies but that was in the 90’s. Do I remember some of the questions we asked? Yes I do. To be honest, when we had a real emergency, it was the paramedic that handled the patient and I was merely the “ambulance driver”. I did this for my community because it was the right thing to do for my towns and got the EMT training as part of it. It was one of the greatest things I have ever done, but was never a career choice.

So now, yes now, from my perspective, I finally understand “denials”.  I also now understand why there’s frustration on the EMS side with their perception of patient’s “denials”…

Seems to me that maybe both our education and preventative materials around heart related issues might need some updates. The discussions with my wife (who now is a well-known and respected EMS regulator for our county) suggests that our medical community may want to take a different approach to their stamping of “chest pain” on victims of heart related issues too. It is a contributing factor to the perceived denial that might affect the treatment of what could be a life and death decision…

We are after all humans first, heart related victims second. It is stressful to go to any ER for any reason. Why add this verbal element to the chaos for a patient, simply because we get stuck in jargon that might put the patient in a place that inhibits the treatment which ultimately can save their lives.

Just saying’=D

In the end. if you do not feel good and have any of these symptoms, please go to your doctor and have it checked out, or better yet, call 911.

I’m glad that I have a wife that cares enough to both take me to the ER against my will and have the willingness to work thru our initial disagreement about the term “chest pain” vs. “chest pressure/discomfort”.

 Maybe my experience will help someone. If it does, my time here at Customikes was well worth it =D

What did I learn?

Stay on top of my blood pressure meds, don’t wait and listen to your body. Your body is pretty smart and is designed for self-preservation. Yes, listening to your wife is good too =D I passed all my tests and it all turned out OK. Just got to drop my weight and move around a little better which both my horse, wife and body will like… =D

Below you’ll find some references that might be helpful.

What are the symptoms?
The most common symptom of coronary heart disease (CHD)  is chest pain, but CHD can also be “silent” causing a heart attack or sudden death without any warning signs. The “classic” symptom of a heart attack is pain or pressure in the chest that can spread to the arm, shoulder, neck or jaw. This pain/pressure may also come with shortness of breath, sweating, nausea or light-headedness. Some people experience abdominal pain, nausea, shortness of breath, palpitations or weakness without any chest pain. If you have any of these symptoms, see a doctor immediately.

For more information on Coronary Heart Disease, visit these web sites:

• The American Heart Association
• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute
  

(Source for above info)

Heart attack symptoms may begin slowly, causing mild pain and discomfort. They can occur at rest or while you’re active. Depending on your age, gender, and other medical conditions, symptoms may be more or less severe.

My wife wisely wanted to add her comments and perspective to my blog too =D

As an emergency medical professional since 1980, I would like to add a couple of things:

1. Women, you are much less likely to have the chest pain than men are.  And, the older you get, the more obscure the symptoms are.  Things like sweating for no reason (unrelated to hot flashes), nausea, vomiting, fatigue, and general malaise can all be symptoms of a heart attack.  I know – it makes it really difficult to decide when it is just being tired and when it is an emergency. Trust your gut – that’s all I’m saying.

   

2. Don’t be afraid to call 9-1-1.  Paramedics can do a 12 lead ECG on you to determine if you are having one of the types of heart attacks that are really time critical, and then transport you to the proper hospital.  Not all hospitals are equipped or experienced at doing the time critical interventions if you really are having one of these heart attacks.  And if you go to one that does not have the right capabilities, you have just introduced delays in getting the treatment that you really need.  Save yourself the grief and call 9-1-1.  Even if you go home with a diagnosis of indigestion, believe me, no one thinks you are stupid.  If they thought that, then they wouldn’t have brought you back to a bed immediately, started an IV, drawn blood, done a chest X-ray, given you nitroglycerin, and done an ECG.  Even the professionals can’t tell indigestion from a heart attack without a whole bunch of tests, so don’t feel stupid if you couldn’t tell the difference.  Neither could the experts.

   

3. If you choose to continue with the denial and thinking that it just can’t be you, do your spouse a big favor and increase your life insurance and keep up with the payments.  That way, when you die taking your antacids telling yourself that it is just indigestion (don’t laugh – this happens all the time!) you will leave them a rich widow/ widower.

Believe me, this episode has Mike and I talking about a lot of these things. I am realizing that medical professionals (like me!) are really arrogant in continuing to call it “chest pain” no matter what the patient says, and writing them off as being in denial if they say it is not pain.   We need to do a much better job of education – for the public and for medical professionals – because Mike never had pain.  Because there was no pain, he did not believe that it could be a heart related condition.  I love my husband with all of my heart, and I would love to keep him around for a few years.

Laura Wallin RN

Thanks for hanging at Customikes. We appreciate it and you, so stick around will you? =D

K. Mikael Wallin