Woman

I am a keen runner and I live in a national park in Wales, so I regularly run by myself in the hills. This is my happy place. Last year I ran for Wales for the first time, representing my country doing what I love, which was an incredible feeling. In early January of this…

At the end of summer in 2018, I was days away from the beginning of my college soccer career at Furman University. Every day that summer, I was preparing my body physically for the demands of being a college athlete. During my last workout before I left for preseason, I began experiencing chest pain, shortness…

It was the last day of our honeymoon. We were packing when I had a sudden onset of nausea, and I was also hot, dizzy, and out of breath. It felt like I was running a marathon every few feet I walked. But I was determined to enjoy our last day, so I took a…

I am a 24-year-old  old active and healthy woman. No real elevated risk factors for clots. I never thought it would be me. I had underwent an ablation, minimally invasive procedure to treat supraventricular tachycardia (SVT), which is an abnormally fast heart rate originating in the upper chambers of the heart (atria). They said that my SVT…

I am a three-time pulmonary embolism survivor! My first PE was in 2003 after childbirth complications (including a collapsed lung), which caused me to be hospitalized for one month. After I was released from the hospital, I returned one week later with shortness of breath while my lungs were still healing and stayed in the hospital…

I just had my one-year clotiversary! Last Presidents’ Day, on February 19, 2024, I faced a life-altering struggle. After days of coughing up blood and an urgent care provider’s dismissive reassurance that I simply had a bad case of bronchitis, I finally found help in the emergency room. Doctors diagnosed me with an unprovoked pulmonary…

In April 2020, at the peak of COVID, I started experiencing pain in my lower back. During a walk with friends, a sharp pain would shoot down my right leg with every step. I tried to ignore the pain and continued the walk. Later that evening, my leg started to swell, and the pain got…

On March 31, 2023, while playing high school softball, an opposing player slid into me, breaking my tibia and fibula. I was taken to a nearby hospital via ambulance where I underwent surgery the next morning. My leg had some swelling over the next couple of months, but it was never bothersome until June 8.…

On a Saturday night, five days post-hysterectomy, I felt mild rib pain on my right side and became easily out of breath, even just rolling over in bed. Thinking it was my asthma, I used my inhaler and messaged my OB since breathing issues were on my watch list. My OB responded Monday morning, asking…

At the age of 20, two weeks after giving birth to my beautiful baby girl, I had extreme pain in my lower calf and could barely move. It was swollen, red, and hot to the touch, and heavy. I was frightened! I went to the hospital, where I was diagnosed with a DVT and hospitalized…