Friday I experienced by far the scariest injury I have had to date through my training. My theory is that my HR monitor has been too tight, but we aren’t really sure how it was caused. This injury is inflammation of cartilage in the rib cage. They symptoms? Are 100% identical to a heart attack.
Imagine this. Your daily life has become extremely stressful. Your days are long. You think you are handling it in stride as best as you can, but then you wake up 2 hours earlier than normal with terrible sharp chest pain. It turns into a dull ache lasting past lunch. Your day gets worse. Your chest pain is still there. You wonder, is this killing me? Really? You realize it’s a long weekend for doctors. You decide to try to get in to see your doctor… and they tell you to go to the ER. You refuse since you are a healthy triathlete in your 20’s. They insist. You have things to do. They put you on hold then tell you that they conferred with the doctor and you need to drop everything you are doing and get there immediately. Yeah, I was scared.
My family doctor is really good. An EKG and Chest X ray later, a full exam and a lot of questions, I am diagnosed with Costochondritis. It will go away and I can train through it.
After my 22 mile run today w/ my HR monitor, the pain was really bad. I’m now pretty sure it was my too tight HR monitor strap. I’m so glad its only inflamed cartilage. Now, I need to find a way to reduce the stress. That was a real eye opener.