Chest pains causes chest pains!

[Chelsea Doak]

So, today I found out a resident at my work have a massive heart attack and died at the dinner table. My biggest fear is having a heart attack and dying myself!

I started having chest pains after I got home started thinking more about it... now I know how abnormal it would be for me, a 21 year old girl to suffer from a massive heart attack.

I just want to know how you guys deal with your chest pain? Take a bath? Lay down? Step outside?

They are just fast, quick pains. They come and go... but then I get get anxiety about it!!

Lately I've been thinking I might have a pulled muscle in my chest or back because sometimes it only hurts when I move a certain way?

It's making me feel a little better to talk about it right now. Just need a little advice I guess..

[grr32]

I've been to the Emergency Room 3 times in these passed 2 moths now with related symptoms and other severe ones too ranging from loss of circulation and numbness in left arms and fingers, just about anything right up the alley to heart attack related symptoms. After 3 visitations to the Emergency Room, I've got the same answer 3 times in a row and that's that I'm healthy and shouldn't be worrying about these things at 25 years old, but I'm 25 years old with these symptoms, does that sound normal for stress or anxiety? I'm sorry to hear that you're feeling this was and hope you manage to get through this.

[Kixxi]

So, today I found out a resident at my work have a massive heart attack and died at the dinner table. My biggest fear is having a heart attack and dying myself!

I started having chest pains after I got home started thinking more about it... now I know how abnormal it would be for me, a 21 year old girl to suffer from a massive heart attack.

I just want to know how you guys deal with your chest pain? Take a bath? Lay down? Step outside?

They are just fast, quick pains. They come and go... but then I get get anxiety about it!!

Lately I've been thinking I might have a pulled muscle in my chest or back because sometimes it only hurts when I move a certain way?

It's making me feel a little better to talk about it right now. Just need a little advice I guess..

Hi Chelsea,

It is quite common to project chest pains on yourself if someone in your environment suffered a heart attack, more even, people who have anxiety tendencies will most likely project those feelings. I am unfortunately one of them as well. If I hear about someone getting sick and having certain symptoms, I start experiencing it pretty fast. I did notice it started to get less the more control I had over my anxiety levels. Soon as I stopped being afraid of the fear itself, and understood that the feelings I was experiencing was due to projection, it stopped in a matter of hours. Don't forget, what you are feeling will pass. It may seem a bit difficult in the beginning, but I am so sure you can do this.

[danielhermanson]

It's always a good idea to visit a doctor at least once and rule out any potential heart health issues. Anxiety causes chest pain, but an important factor in reducing the stress of that chest pain is making sure you're confident your heart is in good health. Visiting a doctor is never a bad thing.

Because chest pain often occurs during anxiety attacks and with other anxiety symptoms, it can be extremely frightening. Nevertheless, often this chest pain is completely harmless.

There's no guaranteed method of knowing whether or not chest pain is caused by anxiety or by a heart problem. But generally the two differ in their overall experience:

Anxiety Chest Pain:

- Tends to be sharper.
- Is usually more localized to a specific area.
- Closer to the middle of the chest, although not necessarily.

Cardiac Chest Pain

- Tends to radiate all around the shoulder and possibly the jaw.
- Tends to be a duller pain, like the heart is being crushed.
- Lasts longer than 10 minutes or more.

The best way to control chest pain is with prevention, by reducing your overall anxiety symptoms. The less you experience anxiety, the less risk you'll have for chest pain.

Here are some effective methods for overcoming anxiety chest pain:

>> Control Your Breathing. Remember that this type of chest pain is often caused by hyperventilation, and even if you're not hyperventilating, getting your breathing under control is a great way to calm the nerves. Take slow, controlled breaths using deep breathing techniques that take at least 15 seconds and you'll quickly see a difference.

>> Control Your Thoughts. One of the reasons I recommend going to a doctor first is because understanding that your chest pain is anxiety related reduces the severity of the experience. If you know that your heart is in good health, don't let your thoughts spiral out of control. Otherwise you may make the chest pain worse.

>> Control Your Environment. Chest pain caused by thoughts or anxieties is often made worse when you sit and focus on the experience. See if you can give yourself a healthy coping distraction, and much of the chest pain will fade away.

General anxiety control techniques are the most important strategy for reducing the experience of chest pain.

I hope this helps. Take care!

[NixonRulz]

So, today I found out a resident at my work have a massive heart attack and died at the dinner table. My biggest fear is having a heart attack and dying myself!

I started having chest pains after I got home started thinking more about it... now I know how abnormal it would be for me, a 21 year old girl to suffer from a massive heart attack.

I just want to know how you guys deal with your chest pain? Take a bath? Lay down? Step outside?

They are just fast, quick pains. They come and go... but then I get get anxiety about it!!

Lately I've been thinking I might have a pulled muscle in my chest or back because sometimes it only hurts when I move a certain way?

It's making me feel a little better to talk about it right now. Just need a little advice I guess..


Hey, Chelsea

Most people with health anxiety or hypochondria usually have one thing in common.

Fear of death

I can't address why you fear death, if that is the case but to me it usually doesn't matter why because well, you fear death now.

Discovering why will let you know the start of things but that surely doesn't make your fears just disappear

So the question becomes why fear and worry about the only thing in life that you have zero chance of changing?

We are all gonna go. Where? No one knows for sure I suppose but most have their personal beliefs

And putting a little perspective on it, people that have near death experiences, regardless of how they nearly died all have reported the same thing.

No pain at all and it was really cool what they saw

So you, me and many others stop living and enjoying life just to fear death

Something that might be the most beautiful thing ever yet we treat it as a painful evil

[superchick22684]

If I get chest pains that are bugging me and causing me to become anxious the best ways that I've found to deal with that is distracting myself. The best ways that I've found to do this is through guided imagery and progressive muscle relaxation.

[Chelsea Doak]

Thank you guys! This really helps! I went to the doctor last year around this time and got an echocardiogram done that said my heart was perfectly healthy! I've decided to go see a therapist to help me learn some coping strategies when I start thinking my irrational thoughts!

Thanks again $

[onebreathatatime]

I get chest pains daily and most of them I think are from my awful posture and when I'm driving im extremely tense as im terrified of getting into an accident.

Normally as soon as I feel a chest pain I get the adrenaline rush and my arms go tingly but I can prevent it from going into a full blown panic attack. I use self talk to remind myself I'm healthy, hot showers, light stretches, correct my posture as often as I remember, I've been going to massage therapy and also checking myself frequently to see if I'm holding everything tense then I just remind myself to relax.

I get this terrible sharp pain in my left side that comes on really quick and then I feel like I can't move till it passes, it even hurts to breath but I have asked my cardiologist and he said its the chest wall and just to try to relax... The closest thing I have found to describe that pain is "precordial catch syndrome".. Maybe this is what you experience?

I also get this weird tightening sensation under my left breast and again was told it was the chest wall and nothing serious. This one however still really worries me as I notice it most when I am laying down on my back going to sleep. The worst part with this is that the more I focus on it the more it feels like it's getting tighter :(

But all in all its nothing and we have to remind ourselves that even though we feel things in our chests that it doesnt mean "heart attack" there are so many other possible reasons we feel the way we do!

Keep positive and just remember to breathe.