the one time I went in to the ER for a weird chest thing, they told me it must be indigestion because the tests were normal, and then gave me a medication that the top of my chart says I can't have because it makes me psychotic. :o/ Of course this was at Dominican.
It certainly wasn't indigestion...it didn't hurt but was more like the wind getting knocked out of me once a minute like clockwork for a few hours. My best guess was anxiety-related muscle something.
But yeah, most docs these days appear to be idiots.
Yeah, my thing feels something like what you described. My mom hopped on the acid reflux band wagon, too. And feeling like you've been punched in the sternum every couple minutes every once in a while IS NOT a symptom of GERD. What did you do? Did it go away?
Sounds more like panic attacks than acid reflux to me.
I am sure that you already know that it is very common for anxiety and stress to cause ones heart to flip out. That is one of the very classic panic attack symptoms. Usually what people describe is their heart racing and/or chest pain. That doesn't quite sounds like what you are describing, but it is close enough to sound like if could be an anxiety response, if they tests turned up nothing wrong with your heart itself.
The doctor can probably explain the mechanisms by which this happens and what it is that your heart or chest muscles are DOING in there when you feel like you are being punched in the sternum if you ask about it.
If not, a psychiatrist might be more helpful in explaining what's going on and telling you what, if anything you should do about it.
Yeah, panic does make your heart do weird things, but they can point to an abnormal heart graph and say, "There's your problem". They didn't see anything in my graph... so... I'm really confused as to what I AM feeling, if it's not my heart.
Well...it went away after 24 hours. In the ER they gave me green goo to drink that made me want to rip out my IVs and kill the next person that came in the door (seriously) but I was hyperventilating and BP so high that it was hard to act on it, and thankfully no one came in the room for 30 minutes so it slowly wore off. They prescribed all this heartburn crap and this stuff Donnatol (sp?) which would have been like the green goo but worse...Its main ingredient is atropine I think and I'm not supposed to have atropine, any of its derivatives, or anything that acts on that pathway like most cough and cold medicines. I kind of wish I'd sued or something because they later told me they chose to ignore the thing on my chart because they said it 'was a childhood sensitivity' (which it was not
( ... )
But yeah...my bet is on stress/anxiety. This DOES NOT mean the same thing as 'it's all in your head'...the brain-body connection is a mysterious thing. I suspect you understand your digestive system well enough to recognize heartburn or any of those things, and as you said you didn't have any of the other weird heartattack type symptoms. Still, it sounds like what you did (aspirin even with shitty side effects, plus going in when possible) was probably the best thing to do.
For me I also get more weird body effects from stress when something is off about my medication, diet, exercise level, hormones, or hydration.
Well, even if it is stress... that's fine, really. But the stress has to be doing something, doesn't it? Why couldn't they see that in the test results graph?
I'm going to be able to talk to the doctor tomorrow. Hopefully I can find out if there's an acceptable next step in finding out whats going on.
It sounded like what you were feeling was intermittent. Were you feeling it when they did the test? If your heart wasn't doing anything weird at the time that they were watching then it makes sense to me that they couldn't see anything weird. Which is frustrating, but not surprising.
It certainly wasn't indigestion...it didn't hurt but was more like the wind getting knocked out of me once a minute like clockwork for a few hours. My best guess was anxiety-related muscle something.
But yeah, most docs these days appear to be idiots.
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My mom hopped on the acid reflux band wagon, too. And feeling like you've been punched in the sternum every couple minutes every once in a while IS NOT a symptom of GERD.
What did you do? Did it go away?
Reply
I am sure that you already know that it is very common for anxiety and stress to cause ones heart to flip out. That is one of the very classic panic attack symptoms. Usually what people describe is their heart racing and/or chest pain. That doesn't quite sounds like what you are describing, but it is close enough to sound like if could be an anxiety response, if they tests turned up nothing wrong with your heart itself.
The doctor can probably explain the mechanisms by which this happens and what it is that your heart or chest muscles are DOING in there when you feel like you are being punched in the sternum if you ask about it.
If not, a psychiatrist might be more helpful in explaining what's going on and telling you what, if anything you should do about it.
Reply
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But yeah...my bet is on stress/anxiety. This DOES NOT mean the same thing as 'it's all in your head'...the brain-body connection is a mysterious thing. I suspect you understand your digestive system well enough to recognize heartburn or any of those things, and as you said you didn't have any of the other weird heartattack type symptoms. Still, it sounds like what you did (aspirin even with shitty side effects, plus going in when possible) was probably the best thing to do.
For me I also get more weird body effects from stress when something is off about my medication, diet, exercise level, hormones, or hydration.
Reply
I'm going to be able to talk to the doctor tomorrow. Hopefully I can find out if there's an acceptable next step in finding out whats going on.
Reply
If your heart wasn't doing anything weird at the time that they were watching then it makes sense to me that they couldn't see anything weird.
Which is frustrating, but not surprising.
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They should have seen it...
I really hope they can tell me something.
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