I’m not dying, dead or a drama queen, so there won’t be any “oh noes, I’m dying!” posts or attention-seeking anything here.Okay, now that that’s over with, here’s the situation:
I have sleep apnea (and have had for the past several months at least), which means that I suddenly stop breathing while I’m asleep. It’s about as fun as it sounds too, but it hadn’t caused any real problems to speak of until last week.
On Friday, I woke up because of this horrible stabbing pain in my chest and a huge headache. Once I woke up, I realized that I wasn’t breathing, and my heart started racing once I took a few breaths. I took a tylenol, an aspirin, and an advil (I woke up pretty confused) and checked my pulse once I’d settled down a bit. It was elevated, but a bit below the ‘call 911!’ range. So I let it go and decided not to call a doctor. I had some chest pain or discomfort off and on throughout the day, but kept taking aspirin and told myself that it was just a reaction from not breathing for a couple of minutes. We went out to a craft store and I kept feeling out of breath for really no reason, just standing or walking a few feet or even just sitting quietly. After a while I decided that I felt okay I guess and went to bed.
I woke up sometime that night (Saturday), with the left side of my face numb and my left arm partly numb and not being able to move/control it normally. I sat up and the feelings passed after a few minutes, and I wound up going back to sleep. I had some mild chest discomfort throughout the day, and took more aspirin. I also had some stomach issues (most likely from the stress of everything), and was feeling just generally “off.” My roommate and I went to the video store and I kept feeling like I was going to faint or fall down, so I kept leaning against the counter and taking deep breaths and pacing to try to stay with it enough to not pass out while he signed up for a video card. I was feeling really wiggy when Molly got back from work, and wound up telling her what was going on (with some key details omitted). She worked on my chest muscles just in case they were the reason for the chest pain, and put a nice hot pack on it (it hurt a lot since I’ve got tons of knots in my muscles). It didn’t make me feel any better, but I wasn’t having chest pains at this point. I was feeling dizzy every once in a while, and getting tired really easy (and still feeling out of breath a lot). I went to bed feeling like ass.
When I woke up on Sunday, I hadn’t had anything go numb or any major organs being in extreme pain, so this was definitely an improvement! 
But it wasn’t that much of an improvement… I was still dizzy a lot, really weak, felt like I wasn’t getting enough air, and every once in a while I felt like I was in an elevator that was going down too fast. I also had horrible stomach cramps and GI issues (again, probably from the stress). 
I kept getting woozy and feeling like I was going to pass out. Even though I was sitting, I felt like I was going to faint during Little Miss Sunshine last night (great movie by the way). Molly asked me if I needed to go to the hospital, and I told her no, that I’d go to the doctor today instead (thus hopefully avoiding a ridiculously expensive trip to the ER). I was really afraid of going to sleep in case something happened to me, so I only wound up getting an hour’s worth of sleep and staying up to make bracelets (it’s a good stress reliever).
Which brings us to Today. I feel worse. I’m feeling weaker, still breathless, unbalanced, and a little dizzy. Stomach pain is intermittent, and I’m feeling very very tired. If Phineas didn’t have some appointment today I’d have him drive me to the doctor, since me walking half a mile from the train station to their office is going to be pretty interesting with me in this condition. I might take a cab if I can flag one near there. I leave at ten, so hopefully I’ll get there at 11am when they open… I’m also hoping that they have an empty slot today since I don’t actually have an appointment.
The possibility of me being admitted to the hospital has turned into “most likely will be.” I don’t even want to know what my pulse-ox is right now. Ick. They’ll probably do a head CT (take pictures of my brain) and give me oxygen, and after that it’s up in the air as to what happens…
So what can we learn from this scenario? Anyone? Anyone?
I’M A FUCKING IDIOT! 
I completely ignored signs of both a heart attack and a stroke on the same day, kept it a secret, and am hiding key facts about all this from Molly (and I NEVER keep things from her). This morning I finally told phineas why I’m going to the doctor so that he’d stop asking me to finalize plans for today, and then I brushed it off like it wasn’t serious, no big deal.
All of this is probably a series of TIAs — “A temporary serious mini-stroke lasting only a few minutes.”
Patterns of symptoms of TIAs:
* Sudden onset of symptoms
* Episodes of stroke-like symptoms – see the symptoms of stroke
* Short duration of episode – usually a few minutes up to 30 minutes; rarely more than 2 hours. If lasting 24 hours, then it’s a stroke
* Recurring stroke-like attacks possible – although not recurring in some cases, other cases may recur up to several times a day.
Having another one now I think, my neck is feeling weird and my left hand is as well. Got to go for now, don’t get too worried since I’m headed to the doctor today to get checked out. Wish me luck!
Griffin
