Unprovoked

One week I was a healthy 24-year-old hiking mountains, the next I was bedridden in a hospital with an unprovoked 20cm DVT. I had an unusual cramping pain in my leg on a Friday night. I took some painkillers and decided to sleep it off. The next morning I felt okay and set off for…

I’ve always had a history of health anxiety, always expecting the worst whilst hoping for the best. It took many years for me to manage my fears and understand when I was being rational or otherwise. Toward the end of April 2024, I had this horrible chest pain, directly along the left side of my…

I was at work just sitting down when my heart started racing. My Apple Watch alerted me that my heart was beating at 140 bpm, something I had never felt before. I chalked it up to just being overworked and tired. I drank some water and took a break. My heart started to slow down…

In November of 2022, I was driving home from work when out of nowhere, my heart started hammering and went out of rhythm. I made it home and told my partner that I wasn’t okay and needed to go to the ER immediately. We got as far as the local urgent care where I told…

My story began with a nagging ache in my calf. I had ignored it for a few days thinking it was a pulled muscle. Other than a leg cramp, I did not have any other symptoms. I had done my usual six-mile run and worked in the yard later that day. It was not until…

It all began around the Christmas holiday in 2022 when I started experiencing what I thought was indigestion. Despite trying various over-the-counter medications, nothing seemed to relieve my discomfort. By New Year’s Eve, my condition had worsened, but I pushed through to celebrate the new year. However, while ascending the train steps, …

As told by her mother, Noelle. My daughter passed at age 27 from a saddle pulmonary embolism on February 28, 2024. She stayed home from work with a headache. She got up after a nap, came downstairs and passed out. She came to and was clammy and sweaty. She said she was fine but we…

In the spring of 2023, I gained a new appreciation for the gift of breathing. Over a period of weeks, I grew increasingly short of breath. As I was misdiagnosed twice, first with allergy-induced asthma and then bronchitis, I struggled more and more to breathe during everyday activities. After several weeks, I was so short…

I started experiencing pain in my left calf and by morning the next day, I was in excruciating pain. I called my doctor’s office and they asked me to come in as soon as possible. After the D-dimer bloodwork results showed I likely had a clot, I received a Doppler scan that revealed the DVT.…

I had my first DVT about 15 years ago after a surgery that damaged my deep vein, which slowed the blood flow and increased the risk of clots. I gave myself enoxaparin injections and went on warfarin (that’s all there was at the time) for six months. Two years ago, I had an unprovoked superficial…