In the middle of the night on Thursday (Friday morning at 3:30am) I woke up with terrible chest pain. It was as if someone wrapped a belt around my upper chest and was pulling it tight, along with that I had difficulty breathing. I felt clammy and slightly nauseous and light headed. So of course I thought to myself - is this angina/am I having a heart attack? I also considered, was it just a bad reaction to the aspirin I'd taken about an hour before at 2:30 am? Should I wake up Alan and have him drive me to the hospital just to be safe or should I risk dying rather than feel like a fool with a false alarm. Then the pain got bad enough I didn't care about feeling like a fool. I poked Alan awake and told him I was having chest pain and take me to West Middlesex Hospital (which is basically next door to our estate). Alan was dressed in a flash, and in moments I was in West Mid's A&E where a jobsworth behind the counter nevertheless took my details, slowly found them in the database, printed them out and alerted a passing doctor that I was having chest pain and trouble breathing. (Hold onto your seats, ladies and gentlemen) Within literally 2 minutes I was in a spotless emergency room being hooked up to a EKG machine and other state of the art kit we Americans take for granted but the NHS seems to regard as indulgent and optional. Technicians were taking blood, Emergency room technicians/nurses were getting details and prepping for the doctor who arrived in short order. And - they were all serious, listened to details I had to say, gentle, careful, thorough. The doctor on call that morning was a young woman with fantastic bedside skills who listened and explained lucidly. I'll skip to the end now..it turns out I was not having a heart attack. After 3 hours of intensive checking, testing, 4 sets of blood tests, x-ray, etc they could finid nothing wrong although it was clear to them I had been in extreme pain and brathing distress. The doctor referred me for further testing with a specialty group. However, she explained in detail they could find nothing wrong except that I was anemic as I had told her.
So false alarm? Not really, the pain was absolutely genuine.
Not the way I like to spend my nights. I was exhausted when I got home about 7am and slept most of the day on and off. Of course Alan stayed home - his night was also disrupted. I am unkind enough to have wished he went to work anyway since I just wanted to be alone and quiet.
Anyway that was how I spent my night. I was very impressed with West Mid's A&E staff.

And after all that, it might well have been the aspirin.