Matters of the Heart

I kept ignoring the chest pains.

When I couldn't go to sleep a few weeks ago, due to the pain, I knew something was wrong. I went to sleep, woke up the next day, and went to work. Didn’t give the pain attention.

Yet it was present. Manifesting its way into my chest, making me clutch my heart. I thought that if I held my heart close, it would feel me trying to slow it down. My pulse was too quick, my heart was skipping beats. It was broken. I spent nights researching what could be wrong with me. I’m only 22, how could I be having heart issues?  

But it kept happening, and it got worse at night. Everything was slipping out of control. My body was betraying me.

This past Sunday night, I was on the phone with a friend until the wee hours of the morning, despite my need to sleep. I wanted to talk to him, but I also didn’t want to be alone with the sound of my faltering heart. If I avoided the pain and the idea of sleep, I could stay alive. I could actively stop my death.

I wasn’t ready to die.

I hung up the phone.

3am turned into 4am and then 5am. Every time I fell asleep, I would wake myself up within minutes. I clutched my chest the entire time, massaging my left side. Thankful that I could feel my heart, and hopeful I could will it to fix itself. But when I got up in the morning, the idea of death was so pertinent, that I began to feel sharp pains in my chest. My arms started to hurt. My jaw and my neck. I didn’t know if I was willing the pain to occur or if it was actually happening. I got dressed, walked outside, and got on the bus instead of the train.

“Hi. I have all the symptoms of a heart attack.”

“Did you travel by yourself this morning, m’am?”

"Yes.”

I sat there trying to explain my symptoms. Trying to validate my pain and that despite my young age, what I was feeling was real. I told the nurse I thought I was dying. She laughed, and I got annoyed. I wasn't imagining the skipped heart beats and the sharp pressure. But, I stopped myself from telling her that as I lied in that bed the night before, I thought all the people I loved and how some of them hadn’t heard my voice in a long time. I thought about how I wanted to be loved and how I hadn’t been touched intimately in weeks. That I was avoiding intimacy.  That my body survived death before. That I did the same thing that time, ignored my pain until it was unbearable. That I was avoiding the doctor because I didn't want bad news again. I wanted to tell her that tears rolled down my face, because I was so used to losing things, but I didn’t want to lose me.

Saying those things would make me sound dramatic. So instead I said,  

“My pain is real and I need to be checked out.”

They ran the tests, they knew they had to. After 2 hours and three attempts to pee in a cup, the doctor came back to tell me they didn’t know what was wrong with me, but I was for sure not dying. She sat next to me and explained how the tests came out very well and there was no sign of any heart damage. My heart was beating at a normal rate. I was healthy. I explained how my heart felt like it was racing 100mph.

“Are you stressed? This sounds like stress.”

I didn’t think about until that moment, but she was right, I was stressed. There were things that I wasn’t dealing with. Feelings that I kept putting off until further notice. My fears, my exhaustion, and my intuition kept nagging at me, but I put them on the backburner.

I got my discharge papers and walked to the train to head to work. I asked myself, “What am I not dealing with that is manifesting itself physically? What is refusing to be ignored?”

I asked myself that on Monday. It is now Friday, and I still don’t have the answer. I have been trying to figure it out this week. See how I feel when certain things happen or when I do certain things. I have had some revelations. I have unearthed some feelings, but I don’t know what to do yet.

In my friend circle, I am the one that gives amazing advice. I tell everyone to take care of themselves, get in tune with themselves, and follow their heart. Yet as I got on the train, I realized I was kind of a hypocrite. I was finding ways to self-sabotage and I knew it. I was afraid. I knew a life transition was coming, but I was trying to hold it off. However, when it's time for something to happen, it finds a way to happen whether you are ready or not.  

My heart is my wake up call. 

Its interesting how when you think you don't have a lot time to do things, you get your shit together. Thinking of my death in an immediate manner made me think about everything that I was ignoring. Why am I stressed? Why am I worried about other people? I need to live. Honestly. 

So here is some honesty for you all:

I still don't feel that well. I know I need to go back to the doctor. I need a second opinion. I know I need to take care of myself. It may be more than stress. It may just be stress. I don't know. I am going to figure this out. 

It's the only choice I have.

Wish me luck.