LIVING MY BEST LIFE

If you haven’t read part 1 – please do as there is a lot of background info. Also. I apologize in advance if this seems a little disjointed and conversational. This transpired 7 months ago and I really want to convey the shear terror of my ordeal. I hope others who are going through something similar can learn or get help from my experience. I was not able to convey any of this before because it was triggering and I felt embarrassed. If you are struggling, please get help!

… continued from part 1

Over the next weeks, my heart rate remained high, even when I was just sitting and watching TV. I felt my heart pounding and could see my chest moving. This caused extreme panic. I tried various methods to calm myself and my heart rate. Breathing exercises, anxiety workbooks, walking, aromatherapy, light therapy, drawing, coloring, music, yoga, but none of them lowered my heart rate or brought me relief. The heart rate fueled the anxiety and the anxiety fueled the heart rate. I did journal all my symptoms, and a blood pressure log and every medicine I took. I became obsessive with it. I would take my blood pressure upwards of 20 times a day.

Just as an aside, I was never a panicked or anxiety-prone person. I handled stressful situations well and never had issues with heart rate, high blood pressure or “intrusive thoughts”. This was really new for me and totally out of my comfort zone. As a control freak, feeling out of control made me feel like I was losing my grip on reality. Looking back, I believe menopause was the precipitating event.

I contacted the “practitioner” for a virtual visit and expressed my inability to live like this. I explained that the medicine was causing incredible anxiety due to the high heart rate. She insisted that the Losartan does not cause anxiety, to which I practically screamed in response, pointing out that my 120 BPM heart rate does! She also said that 120 BPM wasn’t that bad. I told her I needed help, and that I felt an “impending doom” and could not function. In response, she prescribed an antihistamine commonly used for anxiety and advised me to “talk to someone”. Despite specifically mentioning that I cannot take Benedryl as it makes me jittery, she claimed this medicine was different and would not have the same effect.

I asked my husband to pick up the medication at the drugstore. After taking one, I felt incredibly jittery, as if I had been hit with an epi-pen. It was beyond horrifying in my already anxious state. I cannot impress upon you enough how completely out of control and helpless I felt. My husband tried to call the after-hours number, but no one answered. He wanted to take me to the hospital, but I refused. The next day, I called again to inform her of what happened, and once more, she insisted that I “needed to talk to someone”. She then prescribed 5 Xanax pills at the lowest dose of 0.25 mg and changed the BP medication to a diuretic. When I checked online to see if they were ready at the pharmacy, I noticed that the diuretic contained a sulfa drug, to which I am highly allergic. Working in pharma for so many years is a blessing and a curse. I double checked my assumption on google that it was a sulfa drug and then I called the office back. She claimed the “system should have caught the allergy”. She switched it to a calcium channel blocker. Throughout this process, it felt like she was simply going down a list of medications, without caring about their effects on me. She also didn’t seem interested in working together to make the best plan for my health and well-being. In hindsight, I really should have removed myself from the situation . . . but again, I was not thinking clearly. I was helpless, hopeless, and vulnerable. My poor husband and daughter didn’t know what to do or how to help. Being the center of our family, I am usually the one that takes care of everyone and everything. My daughter was my rock when my husband was at work.

I asked my husband to pick up the prescriptions on his was home. I was afraid to drive anywhere. He brought them home, but now I was hesitant to try them. I was afraid to take ANYTHING. There was also a warning on the Xanax paper from the pharmacy that it “could cause respiratory distress”. I was like NOPE. Now I was afraid to sleep because I thought I would stop breathing in the middle of the night. And I didn’t even take anything! So add to the other issues insomnia. I was getting about 2 hours a night sleeping in front of the TV in the living room on a club chair. Lying down panicked me.

All the while, I was still working the regular store hours and dealing with the public and spending most of the day down at the store hoping that NO ONE would come in. I was tired. I was weak. I just wanted to burrow into a cave and shut out the entire world. On February 10 . . . a Saturday, the store was busy in the morning, but slowed down after lunch. At around 2:30pm, a car pulled up, so I walked to the front after donning my mask. A woman exited the car and starting walking to the door without a mask. I met her at the door with my box of masks and offered her one. She exclaimed “she wasn’t wearing any F@*&ing masks” , and that I was an idiot for believing the COVID BS! She started to walk back to her car, incredulous as I was, I shouted “F*& You”, slammed the door, locked it, turned out the lights and went up to the house. I was so angry, I was shaking. My husband and daughter were confused when I walked into the living room since the store should still be open. I exclaimed that “I was done! That’s it. No more.” I posted this on my Facebook page a few days later. At that time, I had intentions of opening for NJ Wool Walk. But at this point, I was really so utterly disgusted.

The next day (Sunday) after that horrible woman cursed at me, I didn’t take the BP meds. I needed a break from my heart racing. Of course the bounceback blood pressure was sky high and my head felt like it would explode. . . so after suffering for about 12 hours, I acquiesced and took a Losartan. Now I felt like there was a band around my chest that was squeezing my rib cage. It was incredibly uncomfortable and made it feel like I couldn’t take a deep breath. My husband suggested we go for a drive. It was horrible, I could not sit still. I couldn’t stand the thought I was more than 5 minutes from my house . . . I asked for him to take us home. He again suggested the hospital. I said, “That is where all the sick people are, nope I’m good. . . I jut need my ice, and my pillows.” Chewing on ice, feeling the cold in my mouth was my go to. Whether it was an autonomic response or just a distraction, it helped. That and my squishy down pillows.

As all this was going on I hadn’t really been eating or drinking like normal. I barely had any coffee. Before this mess I was like a 6 cup a day girl – all caffeinated, all day long. Anyone who knows me, knows I was a coffee fiend.

A week went by where I was up and down . . . I honestly don’t remember much of it. The chest tightness was relentless. I kept searching for “heart attack symptoms in women”. I knew logically based on what I saw my dad experience that it couldn’t be a heart attack. I knew it was anxiety, but my mind raced and raced. I thought that obviously I was dying. I was so afraid to die and leave my 13 year old daughter. I did not want to leave her!

Monday, Feb 19 was bad. I couldn’t even feed the animals. . . thank goodness my daughter was able to do it without me. I crawled back into bed and searched YouTube videos for meditation, yoga or other techniques to calm down. Some helped, albeit short lived. My daughter made us lunch, which I barely touched. Then we went for a walk hoping the tightness would go away. It didn’t. We came back inside and I made myself a cup of coffee to warm up. I drank it and like a miracle, the tightness, tachycardia, anxiety, doom all melted away. I was like WTF? A quick google search showed that caffeine withdrawal can cause anxiety etc. I was like, I’m all fixed! My daughter was dubious, but I felt good and we decided to do some drawing. Later that evening, I helped my husband and daughter with the farm chores and felt really good. I even felt good enough to challenge my daughter to some Minecraft Dungeons. I thought I had figured it out. My husband told me to take it easy. I went to sleep and hoped that it would still be rosy in the morning.

Playing into my doom was the fact that I also was really shirking my responsibilities with her homeschooling. Luckily my anal scheduling had kept her somewhat on track while I was trying to survive this ordeal. I knew that there HAD to be a solution. Being formally trained as an engineer, there is always a solution. Also my husband, despite working full time took on most of the farm chores. I truly am lucky having both of them! I don’t know how they managed to deal with it all. I was really a mess.

I woke up the next day and immediately had a cup of coffee. Thinking that the caffeine had fixed me up the day before, I didn’t want to wait. I had the coffee and sat in the living room and put on Game of Thrones. I find re-watching something helps me take my mind off of things without having to focus on new material. And I’ve watched GOT about a dozen times. As I sat there, the anxiety started to come back, so I had another cup of coffee. The tightness around my chest started to intensify, another cup of coffee. I was having trouble breathing, another cup of coffee. MY daughter woke up to find me pacing in the hallway, another cup of coffee.

She asked me if I was ok. I could barely talk, it was hard to breathe. I told her that I think I needed to go to the hospital. She remained calm and helped me gather my things. I called my husband and asked him to come home and take me to the hospital. He was over an hour away, but he said “I’ll be right there!”. 2 minutes must have went by and I dialed 911. I needed to go RIGHT NOW. I called my husband back and told him that I called the ambulance. He said ok and that he was coming home and would see my at the hospital.

to be continued …