Vince H asked: My girlfriend and have been having a really hard time lately, we’re both worried that I’ll have an early death. I’m 20 years of age, turning 21 Sept. 16th I weigh about 360 lb., I just recently quit smoking completely, but even the I would only smoke at 1 to 3 times a week, and that only for a span of a month I used to smoke Black & Milds both Original and Wine with the “Cancer Paper” removed. As of the beginning of last week I’ve recently started having constent chest pains, a weird, warm sensation on the left side of my face, and what seems to be poor in my left arm which seems to switch to my right arm every now and then.
I have Hypertension, about a month ago went to the emergency room because it was the very first time I ever felt the the warm feeling in my left cheek, and the feeling of poor circulation in my left arm, no chest pains, though. But the day before I went to the emergency room the feeling of poor circulation was in my right arm. When I went to the emergency room they ran an E.K.G., blood, and urine test. All 3 came back just fine. As far as they could tell my blood pressure was just through the roof. I believe they said when I was there it was 151 over 90. Which apparently I’m lucky that my head hadn’t rocket’d off my shoulders. I think I heard the doctor that treated me mentioned that it could have just been an angina attack. I couldn’t really understand what she was saying because there a baby that swallowed a penny was crying extremely loud. I was there for about 2 hours or so while they ran the tests, my blood pressure settled to a safe level by the time the tests were done. On the slip that was giving to me, it said that I was treated for hypertension.
the following week I got a new doctor that specializes in hypertension. Even though I gave him the results of my blood test they took in the emergency room, he wanted to take another blood test to check my cholesterol since it wasn’t in the first test. Felt perfect between my first doctors visit and the next one which he told me the results of the blood test for my cholesterol. He told me that my cholesterol was absolutely perfect. And that it seemed I just have extremely high blood pressure for my age. He gave me diet to help lower my blood pressure and told me that I should mild exercises like walk at least 30 minutes a day, But I didn’t do them.
I was prescribed meds for my high blood pressure before the whole emergency room deal.I was taking Hyzaar 50mg and Hyzaar 100mg. To be honest I didn’t have any of these feelings until I started taking them. After I went to the emergency room I started taking them off and on purely because I’d just forget to, I did that until about 2 weeks ago where I took them daily like I was supposed to. The week after I took them daily was when I started to feel the sensation in my face and arm and this time with a lingering chest pains along with a loss of appetite and energy. On a scale of 1 to 10 during the week they pains in my chest were from 2 to about 5 to 6. They never completely went away, just lingered around. Every morning the pains and sensation in my left arm and cheek would flare up around the same time which was about 4:40AM. I noticed this when I found myself pacing back and forth from being freaked out, thinking I’m going to have a heart attack or something each morning around the same time.
That Saturday, Aug. 2nd, I had a doctors appointment, and I told me girlfriend that I was spilling my guts about absolutely everything that I’ve felt during the week, and I did. He ran an E.K.G. to see if any problems have developed. He said that everything looked normal, but he also said that he’s had patients that had normal results on their E.K.G. and still had a heart attack. I don’t think I have to think I need to elaborate on how much that scared the crap out of me. I forgot to tell him that I didn’t start to feel this way until I started taking Hyzaar. But he took me off of it and on Generic Coreg 25mg and 0.4mg nitroglycerin tablets for my chest pains. When he told me that he was going to prescribe me nitroglycerin my heart sank be cause on the way there my dad and I were talking about getting our health back in order and I asked if he was on nitroglycerin and he said no, and he hoped it would never be that bad. I’m pretty sure it hit him pretty hard as well when I told him that the doctor put me on nitroglycerin.
I’ve only used the tablets twice, I think about a few hours after I got home from the visit, and later on that night. But since then I haven’t used them. I really don’t want to use them, but do carry them where ever I go as I was told to. The day after I didn’t take either the Hyzaar or Corag, I wanted to get the Hyzaar completely out of my system before I started taking the Corag. But since I stopped the Hyzaar and started taking Corag my chest pains aren’t constant anymore, but recurrent. And on a scale of 1 to 10 the pains are about 1 to 3. At the beginning of the week I’ve started walking 30 minutes a day. I don’t think I have stable angina, because I would be getting chest pains after I walk, They usually accrue randomly when I’m just relaxing. I figure its between maybe prinzmetal and unstable angina. But I feel that it couldn’t really be unstable angina seeing as how the symptoms call for intense chest pains, and that I don’t have. Even though the pains are no longer constant I say the same thing I told my girlfriend, I’m not out of the woods yet. My doctor never told me what I could have which scares me a lot. But he brings up the fact that I’m still young, which makes me think that it’s not too late.
I’d really like to know whats going on with me, and if I can completely recover from this without having a heart attack or something, having things be the way they were before. Any information about what I have or what I could have would help. I know that this is a lot to read, but I would greatly appreciate it if anyone would take the time to help me figure things out. Night after night my girlfriend and I cry ourselves to sleep because we both fear what could possibly be happening to me, and what could happen to me. Again, I would greatly appreciate it if someone would help make things clearer for us.
Conchita
