My heart was pounding. I was beginning to sweat. My left arm was aching and my chest was tight. I was having a heart attack.
I jumped up out of bed and put clothes on as fast as I could. Made my way to the truck and started driving.
Hospital, here I come.
I knew where the hospital was, I had driven by it many times in the past.
I started driving towards it and it seemed the more I drove the farther away it got.
"I don't have time for this!"
"I'm dying here"
"Where is the stupid hospital!?!"
By the time I got the the hospital I had forgotten all about my heart attack.
And I felt stupid because just as I arrived so too did a group of teenagers.
"They would laugh at me for having a heart attack" I thought.
So I decided my heart attack was just the latest anxiety attack that turned into a panic attack, which then turned into embarrassment. And I was still alive.
Some time later while at the doctors office to get a cortisone shot for my rotator cuff, I was describing my medical history and anxiety attacks and the number of times I had a heart attack and all the pressure on my chest - and then the doctor told me something I wish I'd known my entire life.
I would learn that I actually have costochondritis. It's a stupid thing that not many people have - maybe 200,000.
Costochondritis causes pain and tenderness on the breastbone, pain in more than one rib, or pain that gets worse with deep breaths or coughing.
It makes you feel like you're having a heart attack.
Well, it does me. And it's about one of the most painful things in the world - depending on how severe it gets.
I didn't know I had it for most of my life, I only knew that I had suffered with deep anxiety for years.
There was a time I couldn't even leave the house.
There were many times a friend would come pick me up and we'd get a few yards up the road and I'd have him take me back home because I was going to die.
Well into my 20's I was going to die from a heart attack and anxiety.
Even as a kid I had 3 EKG's taken at various times just to make sure I wasn't dying.
When I jumped out of bed that night and started driving myself to the hospital I knew that was the end. And sure enough, it was.
I would never do that again. That last attack was the opportunity I needed to say, "no more! I'm not doing this again!".
I drove myself back to the apartment, crawled back in bed and went to sleep.
--
Heart attacks, panic attacks, anxiety attacks - not what anyone wants for their life.
I spent years living with those things. Too many years.
Being diagnosed with costochondritis was a life changing event for me.
I finally had a reason for the feeling of my frequent heart attacks - and I knew what to do when I would flare up.
What do you have in your life that 'flares up'? What sickness have you been dealing with? Pains, aches, thoughts? What's bothering you?
It's time to get diagnosed - so you can learn what to do in those times and finally move on.
Shrug it off.
You'll never find the Open Doors and Opportunity you're looking for if you're always concentrating on what's wrong with you.
Your diagnosis may surprise you and you may not even have what you thought you had - good or bad.
But at least you'll know and will be able to move on.
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