Dear Steve,

i am sorry. i appreciate that. but i do not get pain with anxiety these days. i haven't in years.

my pdoc told me if i had any sort of ambiguous spell, like pain, or breathlessness, to just go ahead and take some lorazepam. he said if it is anxiety, the problem will go away. if it doesn't work, the problem is not anxiety but i won't hurt myself. he said this is a way to know if the problem is anxiety or not.

according to his test: Since the anxiolytic failed, the problem is not anxiety. (it may not be heart, but it's not anxiety.)

i have another benzo for daily use and have not missed any doses. i do not habitually take lorazepam - it is for use as needed. 2.5 mg is usually sufficient for an anxiety attack.

i took twice that for good measure - 5.0 mg lorazepam (that's equivalent to 2.5 mg Xanax, fyi). It did nothing for the pain.

all it did was put me to sleep eventually. after sleeping i still had residual pain ... even though i was calm as could be and even felt sort of "tipsy" the rest of the day. that was plenty drug, and it didn't work.

i also did belly breathing exercises before falling asleep - these had no effect on the pain either.

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the pain started central and slightly left of the sternum. i cannot tell if it was "heart level" or not. then it began to radiate from there up my neck (left) and also down my left arm.

this is different to what i've had before, ramping up the Zoloft and different to anxiety pain i've had in the past (years ago) which never radiated anywhere.

there are other factors i am not willing to post publicly.

thanks for trying to reassure me, all the same.



~ waves ~