Heart Attack?!?!!?!????!

Tonight I almost got a heart attack from my mother's false cardiac arrest. Okay, I realize it's a bit unfair to call it a "false" heart attack because she really did experience awful chest pains, but it is such a relief after all to find out from the doctor that there isn't really anything significantly wrong with her ol' pumper. But boy, did I jump off my seat (I literally did I think) from this one!!! here's the story...

I was talking to a friend earlier tonight, when I suddenly got an unusual call from my mom (good thing that she surprisingly managed to USE her phone this time). "Hello Hun? I'm sorry I can't buy those things you need for tonight. Can you please come pick me up. I'm having chest pains and I've managed to sit down here at SM for a while. I'm at the second floor, Women's Plus Size section," she said. As I've mentioned earlier, I literally jumped off my seat from that call. I immediately ran to my dad so we could go get my mother at the mall... we were in semi-panic... things like this should never be taken lightly after all. As quickly as we managed, my father and I arrived at the mall and I immediately sprinted off to the second floor (while Dad looked for parking) to go see if my mother was doing fine. In fact, my dad didn't even initially plan to find parking because we thought that I could just bring my mom down and dad would be waiting for us in the car for us to be able to quickly bring her to the hospital. BUT THEN (tan-tana-dan!!!), when I got there I found my mom... surrounded by sales clerks, calmly browsing through plus-sized jeans. I was dumbfounded as I rushed to her side...

Me: My, are you okay? Come on, let's go get you to the hospital. Dad's waiting sa parking.
Mom: Ay okay na ako Hun. Go call your Dad.
Me: Mommy.. naunsa man ka? Akala ko masakit chest mo? (sales persons were staring at us at this point) What's the character of the pain? Crushing? Parang may mabigat na weight sa chest mo?? Are you having any difficulty breathing? Does it radiate to the sides? Shoulders? Back? Is the pain still continuous? Are your relieved when you sit down? (Nursing Assessment! Hahaha)
Mom: It's still there, but it's a bit better now. It's a choking kind of pain. It's like my chest is painful because I need to spit something I've eaten out. It's not as painful as it was a while ago, but it's still there, though better.
Me: Just around your chest, or does it radiate to the sides? to your back?
Mom: Radiates to my back...
Me: Tara na, Dad's waiting..
(My Mother gets my phone, calls my Dad asks him to go to where we were at the moment)
Me: Mom bah, punta na tayo hospital
Mom: Hunny uy, I'm okay already. No need to go to the hospital.
Me: What?!!.... You need to go to the hospital. Just to be sure. These are CHEST PAINS...

After a short while of minimal arguing as I was trying to get my mom to go to the hospital (I think I almost wanted to cry just so she'd give in. And mind you, she was still shopping for clothes the whole time), my father arrived. My dad also tried to convince my mom to go the hospital, but stubborn little her didn't budge. Instead, she was the one who was able to convince my dad to buy her a couple of new pairs of pants. She also managed to get my father to treat us out for dinner (at this point, my brother, sister-in-law and nephew were also around because we called for help prior to finding out the REAL SITUATION). Fast-forward to a great dinner with the family, my mom finally agreed to go see the doctor.

We went to the hospital to have her checked up, and found out from the physician that there wasn't anything significantly wrong -at least from the tests performed. The physician said that her chest pains were most probably stress-related (true!!!), since she has been under quite a lot of pressure for the past few weeks. So I guess we all went home tired yet smiling after that.

Ayayay! I guess, situations like this one, can truly wake us up to see what we have and how important they are to us. Sure, it was a false alarm... and to be honest, if I think about it now, I'd actually roll my eyes. But I guess it woke me up to how important my mother is to me. And the possibility of actually going through a real emergency like that one just haunts me because no degree of training or education could ever prepare me for something terrible that could happen. It also surprises me to think how stubborn my mother is (and she says I'M STUBBORN! Ha!)... and all these other little things that I've found out about her from tonight. Like what I told my brother (Jay) last weekend -either you become the exact opposite, or you take on most of what they are. ...

I'm still rolling my eyes at the moment, but at the same time, I'm giving out a big sigh of relief. What a night! I think I was the one who could've really gotten a heart attack! Can someone please get me an ECG reading now?!... Sheeeeesh!