Chest Tightness SCARED

[Branden192]

33 Year old smoker, You used to be a fairly heavy drinker for 12 years but quit 2 weeks ago and I keep waking up with chest tightness over the last 4 weeks that feels like heavy pressure. I get cold and clamy hands today I had minor electic shock feeling around my heart that came and went for seconds at a time  I also was able to bike ride 40 -60 miles a week 4 weeks ago now I cant walk around the block without being out of breath and feel my heart pumping hard and feel like im gonna pass out. Also at night if i wake up to go to the bathroom I feel really dizzy and like im about to black out. Been to the ER5 times in the last month with EKG and blood work everytime showing normal. Normal blood pressure and heart rate and admitted one night to a cardiac unit for 24 hour monitoring of EKG and hourly blood work and say im fine  but this still keeps happening I also don't feel well everyday now and I just keep getting told its Anxiety but I was diagnosed with anxiety years ago and was nothing like this!!! IM Scared!!!

[Amykle]

Everyone experiences different symptoms from withdrawals. My son is going through it now. It's been 6 weeks since his last cig. He has had horrible withdrawal symptoms. Chest pain, tightness in chest, irregular heartbeats, dizziness, numbness in arm and the list goes on. He has been to the emergency room 3 times and has had ECGs and x-rays and blood tests done. All come back fine. He believes there is something terribly wrong. I keep telling him it's just his withdrawal symptoms and I do believe that's all it is. He has anxiety and panic attacks from being soo stressed out over all this. I have been able to talk him down from these panic attacks and keep him from going to the emergency room again and again. It will take time I keep telling him and to tackle each day as it comes don't worry about tomorrow. He is doing much better now. The attacks are getting fewer and farther between and I think he believes me now. That he is fine and it will get better each day. But everyone is different. Some may take longer to get over and others a shorter period. My son is taking an anxiety pill that seemed to help him a lot. Just remember when getting a panic attack (chest pains, trouble breathing etc.) Just tell yourself to stop thinking negative, that you are fine and take several long deep snow breaths until it all goes away and it will. Good luck!

[Flycaster305]

I'd start by quitting smoking.  That's not an easy thing to do, but millions and millions of us have done so.  Roz61 makes a good suggestion to have a stress test, if nothing else to eliminate that you have a blockage of your heart arteries.  

I volunteer in the cardiac wing of a hospital, and frankly, it's not unusual for people to have symptoms like yours after quitting drinking.  If your tests are all OK for cardiac and lung function, I'd look to anxiety as the problem.  

Keep us informed.

[Branden192]

Thanks Roz but I spent over night last week in a Cardiac unit and they could find nothing so I am very confused

[Roz61]

Please get to a cardiologist and have them due a stress test on you. I went thru this just near the end of last year around Oct. I had caught a cold and the cold had gone a way but them I noticed that a hurting would come up in my chest off and on. I began to monitor what I was doing when this was happening. At first I ignored it until it began to come on even when I wasn't doing anything to stress my self out. I noticed that I could not walk up one flight of stairs and carry a couple of bags of grocery with out my chest hurting. As soon as I would stop and rest the hurt would go away.It became so bad one night I ended up in the Er just like you with x-rays and ekgs being done and being told I had bronchitis. None of this was the case. When the stress test was done it was stopped in the first increment of the test because the doctor could see there was a problem. A heart cath was done in January which revealed that I had a 99percent blocked artery and a stint had to be put in. Please do not play around with this. Get the stress test.