The Woman’s Heart Attack
IN medical circles, they call it the Hollywood Heart Attack. You’ve seen it: grimace of agony, clutching of chest, sudden collapse, the whole purple-prose panoply.
For my husband, Harold Lear, a doctor who became a patient just that suddenly, it was the first stop in a five-year medical odyssey, one cardiac crisis after another, ending with the ultimate stop in 1978. . .
I was relieved of this assumption two years ago, when I had one of my own.
Mine went like this: altogether well one moment, vaguely unwell the next; fluttery sensation at the sternum, rising into the throat; mild chest pressure; then chills, sudden nausea, vomiting, some diarrhea. No high drama, just a mixed bag of somethings that added up to nothing you could name. Maybe flu, maybe a bad mussel, maybe too much wine, but the chest pressure caused me to say to my second husband, “Could this be a heart attack?” “Of course not,” he said. “It’s a stomach bug.”
Still, that pressure, slight but there, nagged at me. I called my doctor and reported my symptoms. The mention of diarrhea, almost never a presenting symptom in heart attacks, skewed the picture. He said, “It doesn’t sound like your heart. I can’t say a thousand percent that it’s not, but it doesn’t seem necessary to go racing to the emergency room with the way you feel now. Just see it through and come in for an EKG in the morning.”
The pressure eased. I slept, and woke the next morning feeling well. I went for the test mainly because I had said that I would, fully expecting to be told that I was healthy. First the EKG and then the echocardiogram told a different story: a substantial heart attack, “less than massive,” my doctor said, “but more than mild.” We were both stunned.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/28/opinion/sunday/womens-atypical-heart-attacks.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=c-column-top-span-region®ion=c-column-top-span-region&WT.nav=c-column-top-span-region&_r=0
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My Dad lived to 98, and had no cardiac issues that I recall.
I saw my GP few days ago after I had some 'symptoms,' none listed above. He did ekg immediately, 'normal,' and has referred me to a cardio doc for a broader check.
more like labored breathing, and more frequent palpitations too. No asthma here tho. 
And you, dear, are NOT 'that old,' I'll betcha! I AM, but not as old as my Dad was at his passing: 98!
I do think I need some sort of exercise regime, as much as I HATE the idea. Walking is all I do, and even that reluctantly at times.
Although it could contribute. I think it's something more to do with the physiological act of waking up. I honestly don't remember though. 
the aspirin and broke out in hives. That's better if you can do it that way
