Heart Attack Support Group
Heart attack is a serious, sudden heart condition usually characterized by varying degrees of chest pain or discomfort, weakness, sweating, nausea, vomiting, and arrhythmias, sometimes causing loss of consciousness. It occurs when the blood supply to a part of the heart is interrupted, causing death and scarring of the local heart tissue.
hey gang, one last Q for the night sorry for the series.
My brother as I said passed away two months ago at 44 from a heart attack. He had plenty of symptoms for weeks and then hours but did not know it was a heart attack, there was no reason he had to die but that's not my question - just a statement of fact for us all.
Here's what I want to know:
Maybe two or so years -before- my brother passed, he called me about an event that I would like to know if you think might have been an early heart attack. He thought it was a kidney stone, but now I am wondering. This is really important to me so please try to answer yay or nay and not so 'could have been'! :) thanks.
He described a rather sudden pain on his side/back, i forget the left or the right, that was very very painful and stayed with him two hours, he rolled around on the floor which he said felt better and so he thought as long as continued to do that it would go away .. which it did.
NOW.. most people, myself included, would call 911 after 4 minutes of agony.. he didn't.. and i warned him it could cost him his life in the future.. it could have been burst appendix, etc.. anyhow, it DID cost him his life.. he spent 8 hours "watching" and "analyzing" his heart attack all night alone without waking his wife until finally it was an hour before he died that he was sick enough to finally given in and get her attention.. he died on the way out of the house.
Sorry to ramble.. that part is just driving me crazy... but anyways, my question.. In my family, we have kidney stones. I've had two. It SOUNDED to me like kidney stones, he assumed it was a kidney stone since we all had them even though he had never... but maybe now, in retrospect, it could have been a heart event?? or even a heart attack???? I must say that although my second kidney stone passed must fast than the first agonizing one.. it certainly took a long longer than two hours.
Did my brother have a heart-related event two years ago?
My brother as I said passed away two months ago at 44 from a heart attack. He had plenty of symptoms for weeks and then hours but did not know it was a heart attack, there was no reason he had to die but that's not my question - just a statement of fact for us all.
Here's what I want to know:
Maybe two or so years -before- my brother passed, he called me about an event that I would like to know if you think might have been an early heart attack. He thought it was a kidney stone, but now I am wondering. This is really important to me so please try to answer yay or nay and not so 'could have been'! :) thanks.
He described a rather sudden pain on his side/back, i forget the left or the right, that was very very painful and stayed with him two hours, he rolled around on the floor which he said felt better and so he thought as long as continued to do that it would go away .. which it did.
NOW.. most people, myself included, would call 911 after 4 minutes of agony.. he didn't.. and i warned him it could cost him his life in the future.. it could have been burst appendix, etc.. anyhow, it DID cost him his life.. he spent 8 hours "watching" and "analyzing" his heart attack all night alone without waking his wife until finally it was an hour before he died that he was sick enough to finally given in and get her attention.. he died on the way out of the house.
Sorry to ramble.. that part is just driving me crazy... but anyways, my question.. In my family, we have kidney stones. I've had two. It SOUNDED to me like kidney stones, he assumed it was a kidney stone since we all had them even though he had never... but maybe now, in retrospect, it could have been a heart event?? or even a heart attack???? I must say that although my second kidney stone passed must fast than the first agonizing one.. it certainly took a long longer than two hours.
Did my brother have a heart-related event two years ago?
I believe that a heart attack is a very personal event. By that I mean that what symptoms or criteria for one may not apply for another. November 8th, 2008 I had a massive heart attack without meeting the criteria that I knew were an indication of a heart attack.
I was at work and it was between 8 & 9 am, I had started my shift at 4am and within those four hours I had already completed what always felt like a days work. At or between 8 and 8:45 am I felt as if I was suddenly disconnected from my power or energy source. Immediately following that feeling I experienced a migraine headache from hell, and became nauseated. Upon the first set of symptoms I thought I had just picked up a stomach virus going around work, although by the grace of GOD I did not take flu symptom pills from the work medicine chest, I took 3 aspirins. Why? That is the question I have yet to find the answer.
When I told my boss that I was ill, and he obviously could see the change in my behavior and appearance and I said I need to leave he looked at me and refused to allow me to leave. I completed my shift until about 3:30pm when I could no longer stand. At that time I was the General Manager of national restaurant chain so my days were always busy, but this being Saturday it was even worse than one would imagine. Honestly I did my very best to maintain my duties and work with speed which I could not connect with.
Being so ill, I had one of the employees drive me home. Upon arrival to my home I took two more aspirins and attempted to drink a minimal amount of water and 2 Ritz crackers. At that second I began to feel intense pain in my lower back which seemed to uncontrollable muscle spasms. Seconds later my nausea turned into vomiting, and very indescribable pain. I developed pain in my chin, which felt like a Charlie-horse, to the point that I could not close my mouth.
At that time I just assumed that what additional pains and events was the result of the vomiting. I crawled to my bed and by the time Josh had arrived home I was no longer able to walk; I was pasty in color and could not hold anything down. For the next 10 hours I crawled between the bed and the bathroom.
Being convinced that it was the stomach virus I proceeded to shower for the morning shift. Josh who kept telling me to I could not work but stubborn me, I showered. When I finished the shower I could no longer hold myself up and he had to dry me and put me back to bed. Getting my shift covered for that day and the next Monday 11/10/08 I stayed home. I maintained my crawling and kept vomiting. Sunday is absolutely a blur, (I now know that I was passing out) there was no way I could comprehend anything around me. Monday morning early my sister dropped off some Advil and anti-vomiting medication. Neither of the two would have any effect on me or my symptoms.
Josh came home at 3 being concerned about me and demanded that I go to the hospital I of course refused believing that I was experiencing the flu or stomach virus. Literally 12 hours later I called the emergency room and spoke to a nurse practitioner. I calmly explained my symptoms, the length of time and she said that I am one of hundreds who were experiencing the stomach virus going around. Feeling justified in my own diagnosis I agreed to go to the hospital for fluids and figured a few hours I would feel better and be home by noon.
Upon arrival at the ER I was whisked back to the intake room and they put me in the last room available. Since each area was separated by only a curtain we could hear the other patients expressing the identical symptoms that I had. I they hooked me up to an IV of fluids and another port for emergency purposes.
This lady came in who was very nice and spoke so calmly and she fished for a vein to take blood. It was like wildcat drilling for oil. She stuck me multiple times and finally managed to get several vials. Within an hour a doctor came in and told me that I was in kidney failure and had virus in my kidneys. He said very serene that he was admitting me to find out what the cause of all of this was. Someone came in with a huge bag of an antibiotic and they put it in a port and had it flowing rather fast.
Laying in the ER for another 2 hours I actually started to realize that the pain in my lower back had not gone away it was different. Which I credited to the antibiotic, I was wrong. Another doctor came in and asked me a series of questions about when I lost the energy, what day, what time, how did it feel? I told him everything and he looked at me with a very caring face and an extremely kind voice told me that I had experienced a heart attack Saturday morning. So he said that he would be back shortly once he received additional results from the blood work.
While I lay on this gurney I felt or experienced a gamete of feelings and emotions. I felt my heart rate increase which I thought was my nerves and the fear within. Shortly thereafter another doctor came in and touched my feet, my pulse and asked me why do they not have you on monitors? I said I do not work here I have no idea. She began to listen to my heart I watched her eyes get huge like a cartoon character that has been smashed. Calmly she said I will be right back, and she squeezed my hand. Seconds later a nurse ran in my room and put the contact pads on my chest. Josh said what are they doing, I said they are going to shock my heart. I am going into cardiac arrest.
While I was in the hospital I was told that I was not a textbook case. The one doctor said that they wanted to study me. She said that I was very unusual and described what I had experienced and actually had been experiencing for some time. It was in that ER that I first had experienced death the first time and had experienced off and on for the next 24 hours.
During the study they determined that when I get a migraine and nausea or what I called a panic attack I am having a heart attack. They gave Josh and I a list or criteria of what they determined I experienced when having a heart attack. And they insisted that we be aware of all possible symptoms.
No one can say for certain that your brother had signs or symptoms of heart attack prior to his death, but I would say yes. When I was in so much pain and difficulty I slept on the floor because it helped with the lower back pain. Some us (myself actually) responded as your brother did, not taking action sooner. The only advantage that I had is that Josh would not sleep, he watched me for hours.
The one thing that I remember very clearly is that they had told Josh that if I had have gone to the emergency room the day before i.e. Monday that he would have arrived home to find me dead. How they came up with that statement I do not know, but that is what really shook me up. Since that day, I had one other episode in May in 2009. That episode prompted them to perform an oblation to that area of my heart.
Unfortunately I have rambled on, but I was attempting to provide you with the experience that I lived through. After experiencing death I realize the miracles that I was given. I am one of the lucky ones to be here to, with luck help someone else. I am adamant about being a heart attack survivor and not a victim, and that is how I live my life today.
I hope I have helped and not caused confusion.
Not being a doctor but I did look into ths pretty heavy. Heart attacks are insidious, is why he took so long to inform his wife and died on the way out the house.
A kidney stone is like passing a marble through your penis. Now I could understand how some men could be more alarmed about a real sore penis than an angina turned MI. But my opinion is an emphatic "No". It is interesting the composition of kidney stones are close to the calcium phosphate deposits which help occlude our vessels though. Hmmmm. The heart mediactions i.e. Crestor, Plavix etc. help reduce the inflamation caused by this calcification and calcium channel blockers may also be prescribed. But his pain symptoms seem to be of a kidney stone. Just an opinion after some research,
Regards,
Just Joe
You are, quite simply, pure genius. I've just laughed my socks off and must state my agreement with you
Alli
Xx