I most definitely just didn't feel "right" for about a week or so leading up to my diagnosis. I had allot of upper back pain/soreness and felt flushed and hotter than normal, although I didn't have a fever. Then one day I woke up in excruciating pain under my right breast and that finally prompted me to go to a walk in. Luckily when I told them I was on birth control, they sent me for a CT scan and that's what found the PE.

I most definitely just didn't feel "right" for about a week or so leading up to my diagnosis. I had allot of upper back pain/soreness and felt flushed and hotter than normal, although I didn't have a fever. Then one day I woke up in excruciating pain under my right breast and that finally prompted me to go to a walk in. Luckily when I told them I was on birth control, they sent me for a CT scan and that's what found the PE.

I was in pain and tired for a week (at least) before. At the time though I was in class or clinical about 35 hours a week so I thought it was all from that. I assumed the pain was musculoskeletal, like I had messed something up moving a patient. After a couple days off and resting I went to class that Monday, ate my lunch between classes and then called my doctor's office to see if she could squeeze me in because my chest was hurting worse and I was started to feel winded all the time. She told me to go to the hospital. So my PE had probably been there for a few weeks.

I'm having the fever, body aches, and chest pain today, it started yesterday. I am thinking I may want to go get checked out now.

I don't know what the physiology is with this but it's kind of interesting that so many people describe this. I felt fatigued and a little winded for about a month or two before my PE, but otherwise ok. I was going to the gym up until a week or so before my PE, which is when I started DVT symptoms.

But I felt really unwell the morning of my PE collapse and considered calling in sick for work, which I never do. I felt like I'd been hit by a truck, very flu like, nauseous, achy, tired. Well I did like I always do when I don't feel good. I told myself, oh once you shower, and are up and around you'll feel better. Well that kind of back fired.

I'd be curious what causes that, if it's just your body starting to compensate for the fact that parts of it are under major duress. Interesting. I wonder if Tom (Retired Navy) knows anything about this.

I was diagnosed with flu and bronchitis the week before the PE.

Well, I kind of had this, and I kind of didn't. I mean, if I count from when I got DIAGNOSED, I'd have to say that yes I felt pretty much horrid for a month before. But, personally I've always believed that the reason for that is that I had the clots for about a month prior to being diagnosed. I mean, I had just had a baby and I knew the abdominal pain I had wasn't normal, and I had a moment where literally on the day I felt like someone punched me in the chest and I always had trouble breathing after that point. Not enough to affect my ability to function, it just didn't feel right. Doctors had told me this was nothing to worry about, and for some idiotic reason I rolled with that....until like a month later when it all blew up to the point no one could ignore it.

So my point is kind of - I'm not sure there's much of a 'physiology' to it - I'd imagine that those of us who felt sick prior to diagnosis probably were throwing small clots for a period or days or weeks prior to getting diagnosed (some people even found out this was happening to them for months before getting diagnosed). So I think the unwell feeling (and even possibly/probably diagnoses of bronchitis and such) were really just our bodies reacting to the PE's.

Honestly when things are off in my body, it tends to react by feeling a bit "flu-like". Happened both times I got pregnant too - it wasn't morning sickness which I first felt, but rather I felt run-down and achy, like I said, it was a lot like the flu, but there must have been some difference subconsciously because the second time I recognized after about a day of feeling unwell what the "problem" was.

So anyway, that's my humble theory. We just had PE's for awhile before diagnosis and our bodies were trying to tell us something was wrong.

I have only had one DVT/PE but the day before I went into the hospital with shortness of breath and back pain I did experience "sick" symptoms. I had a high fever that was hard to break and my body felt achy/flu like.

Yeah, I felt "off" for a couple weeks before my PEs were diagnosed, but I really think I was probably throwing small clots and my body was trying to deal with them. All those "asthma attacks" that didn't respond to my inhaler were probably clots.

The day I was diagnosed, though, I felt like I couldn't stop sweating. Just felt disgusting and like my body couldn't adjust to temperatures at all. I think, with everything else going on, my body just let that thing go. Didn't happen again after I got out of the hospital.

My PE came 3 weeks after knee surgery. The pain that I now associate with a DVT was at the 2 week mark. After my surgery, I was very tired, even after the pain medicine stopped. The surgeon explained that the tiredness should go away shortly after the surgery, and certainly within the first week. However, I was so tired I wanted to go to bed at about 6pm every night. They didn't have an explanation for it when I asked, but looking back, I'm sure it had to do with my DVT. I tend to get very tired when I am healing.

Also, my migraines got significantly worse and more frequent starting one week prior to my PE diagnosis.

I was feeling sick about 3 weeks prior to my last PE. I had the sweats and felt like I had the flue. I did have a number of superficial clots in my legs and thought it was due to that. When I presented at the hospital I was short of breath, sweating and blacking out. I had a massive saddle PE.

Yeah, for sure I was throwing clots those two months prior to the actual "event." But I think part of the reason I felt SO horrible the morning of my PE event was that my heart was working way to heard as a larger clots broke off from my leg, passed through my heart into my lungs. I had pretty good heart damage from my PEs, so I do think in that regard there was a physiological component to feeling so unwell.

Here's an interesting article about nausea and vomiting prior to a heart attack. I wonder if it's a similar thing:

http://voices.yahoo.com/why-imminent-heart-attack-cause-nausea-vomiting-7984300.html?cat=70

I started to feel "off" in the early morning of the day that I went to the er. About 6 hrs after the initial tightness I couldn't ignore the fatigue and just the feeling like something wasn't quite right. I was 5 days postpartum. After delivery my rn gave me 6 hours strict bed rest plus a catheter because of bleeding. So basically I was not allowed out of bed or to even sit up after delivery. She also gave me oral and iv meds to help clot and contract my uterian muscles to slow down post delivery bleed. A huge part of me wonders if that may have been the per curser to me having a PE.

These are really interesting. So many replies here have mentioned "flu" and that's just how I felt. I still got up for 2 days even though it was a drag to walk and went to graduation (I'm a course leader so I was on the stage). I didn't have a lot of chest pain. Eventually I collapsed - sort of like a faint and that's when my collegues made me go to hospital. In my case, the doctor said I felt fluey because my blood-oxygen level was low and that can make you feel bad. So, now I have a blood-oxygen level finger monitor (just a few quid off the internet) largely because it lessens my anxiety levels!

My allergies were acting up for about a week prior to finding out I have bilateral PE's. Stuffy nose, drainage, etc. Then one day bringing up laundry I had shortness of breath which I have never had. Then within a few days I was having shortness of breath & sharp pain upon breathing under my left breast.

As mewshep mentioned I too bought a blood oxygen finger monitor too, as it does lesson my anxiety. This may be extreme, but I take it in my purse with me everywhere.