This time it wasn’t heartburn or indigestion, it was a heart attack
Colleen Jones, 61, is retired from work, not of life, and is passionate about making jewellery.
The dreaded heartburn – or should I say the dreaded monster, at times that is what it's like. I take Pariet to help combat it, seven out of 10 times it works, the other times not. It varies in what foods set it off, toast for one, not all the time, just sometimes; some spicy foods of course, worse thing for heartburn. Wine is also one of the worst to set it off. I used to love hot milo, now just another no-no. Chocolate too! But since taking the pariet, I can have so much of it without it upsetting me.
I love my coffee, if I have already got heartburn, coffee can aggravate it more. Then there is that type of heartburn, you know the one where it’s like hot air travelling from your stomach up to your throat? Other times it can be that bad I feel lethargic with it, just rundown and very unwell. I am so used to having heartburn or indigestion, indigestion to me is like a knot or the feeling of swallowing a tablet and it's got stuck halfway up the windpipe. That can just be annoying more than anything and just not go away until after a sleep.
This almost stopped me ringing the ambulance when I had my heart attack.
My heart attack was just like something was stuck, like a tablet in the middle of my chest, this one being stronger than I had had before. I was ironing my work clothes, before going to work, when this happened. Next thing both my arms were aching and felt heavy like lead, almost stiff with it. I actually stopped ironing and decided to have a bit of a lie down. I felt worse lying down, the tablet feeling in the middle of my chest was going into my back and really strongly.
I just sensed this was not normal. I knew I had to wake my son up, luckily he was home. My other half was at work. I woke my son and told him I was in pain and I think I need to go to the hospital. He just looked at me and jumped out of bed. I must have looked a sight! We headed for the phone. Here I was more worried about ringing work than ringing the ambulance. Trying to ring work and doing it in panic mode, makes one say wrong things. I ended up just saying, “Hi I'm in pain and going to the hospital.” Or something like that. I was talking to an answering machine, which made matters worse.
Anyway my son rushed me off to call the ambulance. After doing that, I sat down and waited for them. My son who was so calm, put the dogs outside, gave me a drink of water and just kept me calm until the ambulance came.
Yes, I was having a heart attack, this time it was not heartburn or indigestion.
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Related links:
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