The First Five Heart Attacks Don't Count - Part I

Part 1

Your first heart attack might be a simple episode of uncomforting feelings. Or it might get your attention with extreme pain. Sometimes it is masked by other activity and at times it is ignored as impossible to be happening to me or it's just indigestion.

It took about six heart attacks to experience everything I just described in a four day time period.

I felt slight dizziness and then broke out in a cold sweat and felt very faint at the end of my second one. I thought I needed food - I had skipped breakfast.

I wondered at the time if I was having a heart attack but I blew it off. I was 48 but overweight having dropped to 240 pounds from 290. I felt better those days than I had in years.

Thirty minutes earlier I had been at the hospital for physical therapy. I tore my rotator cuff at work and was undergoing therapy hoping to prevent surgery.

The PT rooms were in the bowels of the hospital and at the farthest point from the parking garage. Two or three floors deep underground and several long empty hallways leading to what I thought of as hell. I hated it.

I could have parked closer but I always parked far away from my destination and walked trying to give my heart all the advantages I could. Probably should have gave up red meat and cigarettes and forgot the walking.

Physical therapy - I'll never forget what the company's insurance person told me - no pain, no gain. Same person told me to file my claim under my insurance and not worker's comp. Each time I went I wanted to show her the pain and let her explain the gain. But I digress.

The therapist had me on my back with my bad wing extended off the table. It was the first time he had done this particular move and it felt funny and uncomfortable before he even started. He had me try to touch the floor then the ceiling then I almost screamed.

It felt like he put his knee in my muscles right at the intersection of my back and arm then lifted his leg while at the same time pressing my shoulder down with one hand and moving my shoulder in a circular pattern.

Much like a pitcher or athlete swings his arm in a circle to loosen up his shoulder.