So last week I was rushed to hospital at 4am after collapsing and almost losing consciousness.
On the Tuesday I was fine, did a 30 minute workout in the morning, sit ups, press ups, squats etc and went for two hour long walks after. While I was walking I felt really good with no signs at all that anything was wrong. I woke up Wednesday morning , felt a bit groggy and tired and figured it was due to a bad nights sleep. A little bit later I started doing the same workout I had done the previous day and after five minutes was noticing I was getting out of breath and my pulse was quite high. I didn't think much of that so went to make a tea and started my home working for the day. As the day progressed I felt more and more weird, I was standing up and feeling dizzy but had no pain, by the the afternoon I took my work laptop to bed as I couldn't sit at my desk any more without breaking into a cold sweat.
As I had been completely fine literally the day before I kind of didn't know what to make of it, I had no pain, no covid type symptoms and when I was laying down I felt perfectly fine. I was thinking I might have been coming down with something so just went to sleep for a few hours to see if it would pass. That evening I woke up and needed to go to the toilet, I stood up and started walking and the dizziness set in almost immediately, but I made it to the bathroom ok. When I got up I noticed my stools looked very dark but started getting dizzy again so I made my way back to bed. By the time I got to bed my hearing had faded, it was like someone turned the volume right down for normal sounds and they were ringing incredibly loudly. At this point I knew something was not right, but again I felt no pain, had no symptoms of anything when I was laying down and after a minute my hearing was back to normal. I was thinking at this point should I call and ambulance? But with the covid situation and everything I decided not to despite my best judgement that something was wrong.
I woke up at 2am and needed to go to the bathroom again. I stood up and the woozy feeling came over me again so I stumbled to the bathroom as quick as I could. I sat down because I couldn't stand any longer and cold sweat was pouring off me. I sat there for a few minutes and composed myself, I had recovered again. I stood up and began to walk and then everything swept over me like a strong wave in the sea. I was all over the place along the corridor, I smacked across the concrete walls 4, 5, 6 times? I have no idea how many times I was like a pinball smacking hard against everything super hard. I had just enough sense to put my arms up and protect my head. I finally landed at the end of the hallway, back first into the corner next to a glass door. A door that if I had crashed through and cut myself I probably would not be here now to write this. Very shortly after everything stabilised and I was strong enough to crawl to my room and climb onto the bed next to my phone. Everything I was wearing was soaked through, I had to check if it was blood, luckily, it was just sweat.
After a few minutes I was lucid enough to call an ambulance. I was very conscious when the paramedics came, my mind was clear and sharp, I even made a few jokes with them. They were testing my vitals and me heartbeat was racing at 130-140bpm sitting down and I couldn't even feel it beating. One paramedic asked if I had drunk a load of redbull or something before they came, I said I quit caffeine months ago and I was on no stimulants or drugs. Because of my clear mental state they were apprehensive about taking me to hospital. I told them they had to, they said "Well we will be the judge of that." I looked them straight in the eyes with a deadly serious look and replied back "I can't even stand, you cant go and leave me here like this" 5 minutes later I was in the ambulance on my way to the casualty department.
I was in casualty half an hour later and was being examined by a doctor. His first comments were "Are you usually this pale?" I asked "Do I look pale?" and then looked at my hands, they were white as sheets, usually I am olive skinned. He pressed against my finger tips and they stayed ice white, try putting pressure on your finger tips, you will see them turn pinky read with blood. He examined me a bit more and said "You may be suffering from blood loss, you are severely dehydrated too." I almost started arguing back with him about the dehydration as I had drunk quite a lot that day. They took a blood test while I was attached to a saline drip. They discovered my haemoglobin levels were 74, the average for my age is 140. I had essentially lost half my blood. As a few hours passed I was given a second saline drip and a blood transfusion. This gave me enough strength to stand up briefly to change into my hospital gown. The doctors booked me in for an endoscopy as soon as possible to see where I was loosing blood. I came into the hospital at 4:30 am and by 5pm I was on the endoscopy table ready to go.
The endoscopy was the most horrendous experience of my life, it was worse than any of the fainting and previous incidents before. They start off by spraying a disgusting numbing agent multiple times, like 30 times on your tongue and down your throat. It tastes like rancid bananas that have been dipped in poison and chemicals. I was retching from it, chocking from it as I could not swallow. it was horrible. Next they injected me with something to make your drowsy but not knock you out, I believe it only kicked in after the procedure finished as I was fully conscious and aware throughout. They then strapped a funnel to my mouth and walked away for a minute while saliva pooled in my mouth until I started to choke, they quickly ran over and put a suction tube in my mouth to clear my airways. They then started work as I lay on my side, I could see everything the endoscope camera could see in a mirror behind the doctors. They continually pump gas in your stomach and upper guts in order to inflate everything and see if there is any damage. Imagine the worst bloating you ever felt while things are being shoved down your throat backwards and forwards. I would often dry heave and let out huge burps that would provide a seconds worth of relief before my stomach was full of gas again. As they dug around they found ulcers, three in my stomach and one in my upper bowel. All of them were bleeding, I could see the blood on camera. They had to clip them with essentially a type fo stapler gun to stop the bleeding. They did this while I was fully conscious, I could feel everything they were doing. They discovered the ulcer in my bowel was the culprit to everything, it was sitting on top of a vein and was bleeding out.
After they were done I was taken to recovery where the drug to make me drowsy finally decided to kick in. I was burping copious amounts of gas for 30 minutes and felt absolutely beaten down like I had been assaulted. I spent four more days in hospital, was nil by mouth for three. had constant IV infusions that left my left arm and side swollen, painful and stiff. I was then sent home. I was glad for the experience because I think it is something that will be valuable for me going forward.
It will take a couple of months for my blood levels to fully recover. They only gave me one transfusion as they are not worth the risk. I am still extremely weak but should be more functional in a couple of weeks. I can walk to the bathroom and back and feel ok. I can stand without fear of losing consciousness.
You need to value the simple things in life.
On the Tuesday I was fine, did a 30 minute workout in the morning, sit ups, press ups, squats etc and went for two hour long walks after. While I was walking I felt really good with no signs at all that anything was wrong. I woke up Wednesday morning , felt a bit groggy and tired and figured it was due to a bad nights sleep. A little bit later I started doing the same workout I had done the previous day and after five minutes was noticing I was getting out of breath and my pulse was quite high. I didn't think much of that so went to make a tea and started my home working for the day. As the day progressed I felt more and more weird, I was standing up and feeling dizzy but had no pain, by the the afternoon I took my work laptop to bed as I couldn't sit at my desk any more without breaking into a cold sweat.
As I had been completely fine literally the day before I kind of didn't know what to make of it, I had no pain, no covid type symptoms and when I was laying down I felt perfectly fine. I was thinking I might have been coming down with something so just went to sleep for a few hours to see if it would pass. That evening I woke up and needed to go to the toilet, I stood up and started walking and the dizziness set in almost immediately, but I made it to the bathroom ok. When I got up I noticed my stools looked very dark but started getting dizzy again so I made my way back to bed. By the time I got to bed my hearing had faded, it was like someone turned the volume right down for normal sounds and they were ringing incredibly loudly. At this point I knew something was not right, but again I felt no pain, had no symptoms of anything when I was laying down and after a minute my hearing was back to normal. I was thinking at this point should I call and ambulance? But with the covid situation and everything I decided not to despite my best judgement that something was wrong.
I woke up at 2am and needed to go to the bathroom again. I stood up and the woozy feeling came over me again so I stumbled to the bathroom as quick as I could. I sat down because I couldn't stand any longer and cold sweat was pouring off me. I sat there for a few minutes and composed myself, I had recovered again. I stood up and began to walk and then everything swept over me like a strong wave in the sea. I was all over the place along the corridor, I smacked across the concrete walls 4, 5, 6 times? I have no idea how many times I was like a pinball smacking hard against everything super hard. I had just enough sense to put my arms up and protect my head. I finally landed at the end of the hallway, back first into the corner next to a glass door. A door that if I had crashed through and cut myself I probably would not be here now to write this. Very shortly after everything stabilised and I was strong enough to crawl to my room and climb onto the bed next to my phone. Everything I was wearing was soaked through, I had to check if it was blood, luckily, it was just sweat.
After a few minutes I was lucid enough to call an ambulance. I was very conscious when the paramedics came, my mind was clear and sharp, I even made a few jokes with them. They were testing my vitals and me heartbeat was racing at 130-140bpm sitting down and I couldn't even feel it beating. One paramedic asked if I had drunk a load of redbull or something before they came, I said I quit caffeine months ago and I was on no stimulants or drugs. Because of my clear mental state they were apprehensive about taking me to hospital. I told them they had to, they said "Well we will be the judge of that." I looked them straight in the eyes with a deadly serious look and replied back "I can't even stand, you cant go and leave me here like this" 5 minutes later I was in the ambulance on my way to the casualty department.
I was in casualty half an hour later and was being examined by a doctor. His first comments were "Are you usually this pale?" I asked "Do I look pale?" and then looked at my hands, they were white as sheets, usually I am olive skinned. He pressed against my finger tips and they stayed ice white, try putting pressure on your finger tips, you will see them turn pinky read with blood. He examined me a bit more and said "You may be suffering from blood loss, you are severely dehydrated too." I almost started arguing back with him about the dehydration as I had drunk quite a lot that day. They took a blood test while I was attached to a saline drip. They discovered my haemoglobin levels were 74, the average for my age is 140. I had essentially lost half my blood. As a few hours passed I was given a second saline drip and a blood transfusion. This gave me enough strength to stand up briefly to change into my hospital gown. The doctors booked me in for an endoscopy as soon as possible to see where I was loosing blood. I came into the hospital at 4:30 am and by 5pm I was on the endoscopy table ready to go.
The endoscopy was the most horrendous experience of my life, it was worse than any of the fainting and previous incidents before. They start off by spraying a disgusting numbing agent multiple times, like 30 times on your tongue and down your throat. It tastes like rancid bananas that have been dipped in poison and chemicals. I was retching from it, chocking from it as I could not swallow. it was horrible. Next they injected me with something to make your drowsy but not knock you out, I believe it only kicked in after the procedure finished as I was fully conscious and aware throughout. They then strapped a funnel to my mouth and walked away for a minute while saliva pooled in my mouth until I started to choke, they quickly ran over and put a suction tube in my mouth to clear my airways. They then started work as I lay on my side, I could see everything the endoscope camera could see in a mirror behind the doctors. They continually pump gas in your stomach and upper guts in order to inflate everything and see if there is any damage. Imagine the worst bloating you ever felt while things are being shoved down your throat backwards and forwards. I would often dry heave and let out huge burps that would provide a seconds worth of relief before my stomach was full of gas again. As they dug around they found ulcers, three in my stomach and one in my upper bowel. All of them were bleeding, I could see the blood on camera. They had to clip them with essentially a type fo stapler gun to stop the bleeding. They did this while I was fully conscious, I could feel everything they were doing. They discovered the ulcer in my bowel was the culprit to everything, it was sitting on top of a vein and was bleeding out.
After they were done I was taken to recovery where the drug to make me drowsy finally decided to kick in. I was burping copious amounts of gas for 30 minutes and felt absolutely beaten down like I had been assaulted. I spent four more days in hospital, was nil by mouth for three. had constant IV infusions that left my left arm and side swollen, painful and stiff. I was then sent home. I was glad for the experience because I think it is something that will be valuable for me going forward.
It will take a couple of months for my blood levels to fully recover. They only gave me one transfusion as they are not worth the risk. I am still extremely weak but should be more functional in a couple of weeks. I can walk to the bathroom and back and feel ok. I can stand without fear of losing consciousness.
You need to value the simple things in life.
