Remember how for the past two weeks I've been sick and haven't been able to work out at all? Well, the good news is that I'm pretty much past my illness now and I started working out again over the weekend. Hazzah! The bad news is that last Sunday, I started having severe chest pains whenever I took a deep breath, sneezed or coughed. SEVERE chest pains. Which is AWESOME, by the way. Just picture how it might feel to have someone take an ice pick and stab it into your chest every time you cough - and that's how it feels. So. Much. Fun!
I went to the doctor on Monday. That's how much it hurt - I rarely go to the doctor except for regular checkups - I never really think I'm THAT sick. Well, that's not exactly true. I either think I'm not sick or I'm dying with some crazy, incurable disease. But, generally speaking, I don't go for regular colds or what not. In fact, I'm so stubborn about not going to the doctor is that the ONLY reason went for my upper respiratory infection last week was because I knew my boss would ask me about it. Turns out - I was officially sick! Who knew?
Anyway, my point is that my pain had to be really bad if I thought I needed to go to the doctor right away. I knew that a stabbing feeling in my chest when breathing couldn't be a good thing. Of course, I started immediately googling my symptoms. After ruling out a heart attack, I pretty much narrowed it down to pleurisy or a pulmonary embolism. See what I mean about thinking about I have some crazy disease? Surely, I'm not the only one who does this.
So, on Monday, since the pain really hadn't subsided at all in 24 hours (which was kind of freaking me out), I went to the doctor. After taking some X-rays and an oxygen test, it was determined that I had somehow damaged my sternum / upper right rib area and that tissue around it was inflamed, which was causing the pain. He gave me a steroid shot and some pain meds and sent me on my way. It's now Wednesday, and while it's definitely gotten better, I still have some pain when coughing. I have a few more days of medications, so I won't start panicking again until those are through. But the question remains - HOW did I injure my sternum while I was sleeping? Seriously! Has this happened to anyone? Or am I just a freak? Considering I pulled my back out once while sleeping, it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility for me to injure myself while asleep, I still just think it's a pretty random injury.
One funny part of the doctor's visit was when I got my shot, the nurse said that it was going to hurt. "A sting and then a burn" is what she said. Honestly, I barely felt the thing. I kept waiting for the "burn," but it never came. She told me I must be pretty tough, to which I responded "I'm a triathlete. I hurt myself for fun." Which really sounds like a pompous statement after seeing it in writing, but I didn't mean it like that at all. It was more of a statement that as a runner, or a cyclist, I push myself to my limit on a regular basis. I'm used to a certain level of pain. That shot? Wasn't even close to my pain threshold. And I have to say, that felt pretty cool. I guess all of this training has given me a small level of bad-assery after all.
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