My Heart, My Fear, and the Power of the Mind

[lumberjim]

so.....and this might be long and out of character......but.....

About 5 or 6 weeks ago, I was driving home and experienced a tightening in my chest. kind of like a stitch that you get in your ribs when you bend funny and breathe wrong at the wrong time, ya know? It was right in the middle, and felt 'exterior.' I had just eaten a large hoagie after being famished. I attributed it to gas, as I woke jinx up that night with an exceptionally strong emmission. But then, like 3 or 4 days later it happened again. same basic circumstances. but it was a bit more uncomfortable and longer lasting. I told jinx about it this time, and she stayed up with me for a bit....it went away, and I fell asleep. Again, i was awakend in the wee hours by a powerful urge to purge, so I figured it was gastric, but it nagged at me. About a week later, on a tuesday night, I experienced some more (much milder) discomfort, but this time I had not overeaten. I mentioned it to jinx, and told her about the first occurance, because I had been thinking about it a good deal, and was slightly worried. I wouldn't allow my self to say the words 'heart attack' until then. Jinx told me she had been worrying about it too.

Later that night, I partook rather heavily of a particular herbal form of entertainment. within a few minutes, I began to experience waves of rising panic. I would go goggle eyed, and imagine that I was seeing my last sights. I got a little dizzy, and heard my heart thumping in my ears, sure that I was going into cardiac arrest, and was going to leave my family that night. I rode through a couple of these waves without saying anything, trying to determine if I was just scaring myself, or if there was an actual event taking place. Afraid to tell jinx, because I didn;t want to panic her. yet, not wanting to waste time if an ambulance was indeed needed.

~ as I write this, and relive it, my shoudlers keep riding up in tension, and I have to consciously relax them~

After about 30 minutes, we went to bed, but I just lay there with my heart pumping, and feeling like I was hyperventilating ( it's like a head rush in your entire body). Another half hour, and I coudn;t take it anymore, so I told jinx thatr my heart wouldn't calm down. I could feel it pounding the inside of my chest with my hand on the outside. she could feel it against her chest as she hugged me. That calmed me a bit, but I have never been so afraid in all my life. It was like that feeling you get when you almost go over backward in a chair.....but in 1-2 minute waves instead of 3-4 second flashes. ( I know Stephen Wright has a joke about feeling like that all of the time......but that shit's not funny anymore) In retrospect, it felt like how I felt when my son was born, and I could see that his 2nd and 3rd fingers were fused. I was so scared by the rush of 'what else could be wrong?!' fear that i got naseaus.

I alternated sitting on the edge of the bed, standing, and lying back down as the waves came and went. I can still see the radiator under my bedroom window that I was looking at when the panic was at it's worst, and I had pretty much convinced myself that I was dying right there and then. I can see the rafters in my ceiling that I focused on while the wave passed. fuck! After another half hour of jinx staring at me wide eyed, and talking about whether or not to wake the kids and call an ambulance, I got dressed just in case. We went down stairs, and I paced back anad forth for a while. ( mind you, this whole time, I had not felt a bit of pain in my chest, just my heart pounding nonstop)

I;ve never had a heart attack, and was never particularly afraid of having one for that matter, but I had somehow talked myself into it's inevitability. After bit, we went into the living room, and turned on the TV. I watched George Carlin ,and tried to take my mind off of my beating heart. have you ever tried to NOT think about something?

Here...try this: Take control of your breathing. pay attention....close attention to the oxygen needs of your body, and try to breathe 'manually' within about 45 seconds, you;ll be all fucked up, and will have a hard time NOT thinking about it, and letting your body take control back from your mind.....

eventually, I had calmed down, my heart stopped freaking out, and we went back up to bed ( about 3 hours after I first began to lose my shit)

The next morning, we went to the emergency room, and told them all about it. They took my blood pressure first....very good. ok, now into the room for a consult with a Dr. She ordered a chest xray, an EKG, and blood tests. It took about 4 hours for all of that, and the last hour of waiting for them to analyze the results was brutal, but she came into the room and said, " your fine. all of it looks fine. Follow up with your doctor, quit smoking. but your fine. you didn;t have a heart attack."

I was a little embarrased, ( still am, actually) but also relieved. So why did I panic like that? was the P*t THAT strong? well, jinx had more than I did, and was ok. ( If a bit freaked out by my psychotic episode)

Anyway, even after that experience, 4 days later, I smoked again for the first time, and again, wound up focusing on my accelerating heart beat. it took me another 3 hours of (solitary, this time) listening to my heart, and going for a walk, and doing whatever I could to take my mind off of it, to decide that I can;t smoke that shit anymore. what the fuck?!

since that time, I have not felt 'right' for an entire day. my left arm has felt numb, periodically, I've had miniature feelings of impending doom, cold sweats that I have attributed to low blood sugar......I'm all fucked up. I was starting to feel okay for a while, and then 2 fridays ago, I had some actual pains in my chest.....again on the surface, and probably lungs from too many cigarrettes, or muscular from being all bunched the fuck up all the damn time, but each twinge was punctuated by that falling off the chair feeling. I was out that night with friends, and suffered with it silently through dinner so that I wouldn't ruin the evening. Rum and Coke eventually loosened me up enough to make it stop.

I think it's been about 5 weeks since that night, and I keep waiting to feel 'normal' again. I'm pretty sure that it's anxiety, but I have not yet been able to master it. I focus on staying physically relaxed, but continuously have to consciously relax my shoulders. I need to quit smoking, but when I don;t have one for a while, i get all jittery, and start getting tense again. Excercise helps, i think, but I work so goddamn much.......
ah fuck. I just need to excercise more, i think.

but i wanted to tell you guys about this because you're all fucked up too, and I thought someone might have conquered this motherfucker before.