I almost went into cardiac arrest yesterday. My heart rate went up to 240 beats per minute. I’ve spent the last couple days at the hospital, and had to face an ugly truth whether I liked it or not.
I live near some grocery stores. I decided to walk about a mile through town to go get some food, since it was a beautiful day. I actually took a selfie first, which is great, because it helped me document this from the beginning. It’s relevant, trust me.
On my way back to my apartment with grocery bags hanging off my arms, I felt my throat begin to itch, and my nose began to run uncontrollably. I knew something wasn’t right. I had almost a mile to go. I felt my throat begin to close up as I walked and by the time I got to the apartment I had difficulty breathing. In a few minutes, I looked like this.
Sexy.
I called my mom and said I needed to go to the ER. She’s a nurse and she knew from my drastic voice change that this was serious. She told me to call 911 if it got worse before she could get here. I held out and she took me to the hospital.
It only took them a minute and a half to get me back there. Before I knew it, I was on a hospital bed, with a nurse putting an IV in my arm and a doctor asking questions. “Well,” he said, “It’s pretty obvious you’re experiencing anaphylaxis. We’re going to need to put epinephrine in your IV, like giving someone an EpiPen. You may feel a slight increase in heart rate.” Okay, thanks doc. You’re the best.
Except I completely forgot through all the chaos to tell them I had just taken 200 mg of caffeine through a caffeine pill before my walk.
The nurse, bless her heart, put the epinephrine in and I anticipated the sudden effects as I knew it was going straight to my heart. “You weren’t lying,” I chuckled nervously. Then it all spiraled out of control.
The next thing I remember is my heartbeat spinning out of control. “I think I need to thro… th…” I stammered as panicked tears formed. I rolled over and my muscles locked in the fetal position. I couldn’t move my hands. I remember hyperventilating, trying to move my stiff fingers to no avail. I watched the heart rate on the monitor increase rapidly. Nurses poured into the room and I remember them peeling the rest of my clothes off, but I had no time to be embarrassed. I reminded myself of Buffalo Bill curling up after being shot in The Silence of the Lambs.
“We’re putting another IV in to give you medication to slow your heartbeat,” the doctor announced as one of the nurses rushed to put an IV in the other arm.
”Fuck!” I cried and panted. “I’m dying!” In hindsight, not the best idea, because I suddenly noticed my mom, standing behind the nurses, frozen with her hands over her mouth in a praying position. She was terrified. Not a good sign to me, because it was doubtless she had seen this before.
Luckily, my heart rate began to slow. It hovered at 140 bpm after two doses of the medication. As some nurses left, my mom had room to sit next to my side. “I think you almost went into cardiac arrest there,” she said. “You’re okay now.” The doctor reluctantly agreed. That could’ve happened. But I’m stable now. It’s okay.
At that moment, here I was, after sheepishly explaining that I forgot to mention the caffeine.
After constant monitoring my heart rate fell to a normal range overnight. I had atrial fibrillation and they wanted to make sure it was a temporary result of the episode.
This morning.
Now, I’m discharged and sitting at home, with a lot of funny stories to tell about some poor young male nurses apologizing for having to reach down my gown to set up an EKG. One sweet man held my gown together as I stood up and my whole ass was exposed. “I got you,” he reassured me.
We still haven’t isolated what exactly caused me to go into shock. I have an allergy panel scheduled, but that future appointment didn’t do me much good in the moment.
The ugly truth I learned is that you can be walking, minding your business, and your health can go south without warning. My father had a best friend in college football that dropped to the ground and died before his eyes during practice. He had an aneurism.
I know so many people my age that can not afford an ambulance. They don’t have parents to drive them places. They don’t have a car. They may not know what a serious allergic reaction looks like.
I forgot to mention something so mundane to the doctors and a normal procedure turned into an emergency in a single second. What if my heart had stopped and they couldn’t get it to work again?
Now, I’m sitting here at home, my face all swollen, glue stuck all over my body from the EKG stickers and whatever else, happy to be alive.
The ugly truth about life is that you aren’t invincible, no matter who you are. You can be in perfect health and shit can hit the fan for seemingly no reason. Anyone, anyone can have a life-threatening emergency.
I was asked at one point if I wanted to be resuscitated. I told them with a laugh to please not give me a DNR. One day, I may have a different answer to that.
Please take your health seriously, and for god’s sake, rack your brain to tell your doctors everything you know. Just as importantly, do everything you can to be happy in life. It may end tomorrow, and it may end in two, ten, or fifty years, but you don’t know for sure.
It’s ugly, but it’s true.
You just don’t know.