Introduction

I'm not exactly the "Blogging" type however, I find myself in an unusual situation in my life that I feel a certain need to express "thoughts" so I can not only help myself deal with my current medical standing but perhaps someday help others understand early symptoms so they dont have to travel the hard road I have to find a diagnosis.
For me, the journey started in 2001. While minding my own business, discussing an automotive situation with a customer, I suddenly had severe chest pain, which also led to a very pronounced pounding that I could feel very evidently. I had trouble focusing on the conversation, lost track of where I had left off and apparently had looked rather ill from a skin color perspective because the customer immediately asked if he needed to call 911. Hard to believe that I went from totally normal to knocking on deaths door in a matter of sixty seconds. I convinced the customer that it had to be something I ate and that I would appreciate it if I could call him back shortly to discuss the matter. He agreed, left my office and I headed right for the front of our store and grabbed the Bayer aspirin. Wasnt exactly my favorite thing in the world to chew up an aspirin, but I vaguely remembered someone doing it in a commercial and it supposedly saved his live. So I did it and rather than walking 100 feet to the fire station behind our repair shop, I jumped into my car and headed right for the ER. Dumb I know, but its a macho guy thing. If you are going to have a heart attack, bragging rights that you drove yourself to the ER seemed the better choice. LOL not really the case, I just got in the car and I couldnt really tell you what I was thinking, I just drove to the hospital.
They ran a bunch of tests, I had some tests run by a gastroenterologist as well and after all said and done, released 48 hours later, no results found. I returned a week later and had my first heart catherization done, quite the unpleasent experience I might add. Turns out the medication they used for it did not have any effects on me so I was completely maxed out on the anxiety scale to the point that the cardiologist had to explain to me in harsh tone that he had my fermoral artery open and if I continued to jump around I was going to drain out all over the OR. I managed to somehow stay a bit calmer until he said "uh oh, record that". That was then followed by, "everythings fine, dont panic, EKG STAT, no big deal here, GET HIS WIFE HERE NOW, just remain calm". Oh yea, I was as calm as a gazelle with a pack of cheetah's chasing it.
My wife was brought in to give me the news that the doctor had accidently knocked my heart out of sync, so when the telemetry was hooked up, its looked like a 9.6 earthquake rather than an EKG. I kept thinking, did he say to remain calm? I managed to ask just one question as he stood there studying my heart rate, I said "Doc, is this a bad thing?" He responded with a slight chuckle in his voice, "well if you were 65 or older, we wouldnt be having this conversation, you'd be dead, it should go back into rythum". That made me feel so much better. It did manage to calm back to normal sinus rythum and all was back to the same result, he didnt find anything. So I was leaving the hospital, yet again, without a diagnosis.
This started January 2001 and here we are now in July 2011 I am now finally getting a diagnosis of why nothing was ever found. Now theres alot of missing medical disasters in between that I will slowly post. I have had just about every test known to man and have had failures/complications with my kidneys, gastro, cardio, neuro, pulmonary systems. My doctor wrote down "autonomic disorder" on a piece of paper at my last visit and after a long two weeks of cross referencing all the complications, the adverse issues with medications, the crazy symptoms that no one had answers for, the final out come, DYSAUTONOMIA. I am relieved that as I read all of the information in regards to this nasty central nervous system syndrome, it was like reading my own medical journal but I still have a long way to go. I now have to confirm whether or not I also suffer from POTS (Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome) and also EDS (Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome) both of which directly relate to my symtoms exactly to a tee. I can't believe something that I always found amusing from my childhood is a red flag for EDS. I had what was commonly called, double joints. I could flex arms, legs, shoulders, fingers, ankles to an almost disturbing degree. This is called JHS (Joint Hypermobility Syndrome) which now I am finding out is a bad thing in my case. Who knew?
So in closing, now that I have bored the tears out of anyone reading, this post is just a taste of whats to come. I expect that I will be as medically correct as I can and I will try to include every single ailment that I suffered that is related to this ANS (Autonomic Nervous System) and hopefully it will not only help me to get it off my chest but someday, someone reading this that feels as I once did, where not only your spouse doubts you, but doctors start thinking you need a mental evaluation. I had three mental evaluations, its not pyschosymatic, this is the real deal. Oh, and for that asshole doctor that felt that I was over dramatic in regards to my pain level complaints, Fibromyalgia and Peripheral Neourapathy are two of my other symptoms, the PN has been medically proven by an EGD so you can kiss my big white butt. When I say I am in F'ing pain dude, you better be paying attention and not dictating that I am overdramatizing the issue.
Well its time for me to take my medications and try to go to sleep. Not fond of the insomnia but it comes with the territory. Its currently 02:13am Eastern time so I attempt to whind down for the day. Thanks for reading.