What is a ministroke or TIA?
A ministroke is also known as a transient ischemic attack (TIA). It occurs when part of the brain experiences a temporary lack of blood flow. This causes stroke-like symptoms that resolve within 24 hours.
What happened is this: I was standing in my back yard drinking a cup of coffee, chatting with my neighbour over the fence. All of a sudden I felt lightheaded and I noticed the coffee tasted very strange, sort of metallic. Right after this I felt the left side of my face go numb. My bottom lip mostly and also a little bit of my upper lip. The tips of my left thumb and two fingers went very numb and started to tingle.
I panicked. I remember I yelled out "Something is wrong!" and I ran into the house and opened a bottle of aspirins. Pills spilled all over the floor. I grabbed two and stuffed them in my mouth and chewed them. My face already felt normal again. My wife was there and had me raise my arms over my head. I was able to speak clearly and my face looked fine. There was no pain anywhere. It was over as quickly as it started... the total time for the entire episode was no more than a minute.
(Here's a picture I took of some flowers. It has nothing to do with the story, I just think every post needs an image.)
It has now been a day since this happened. Everything is fine except for the fact that I'm scared half out of my wits. I was afraid to fall asleep last night. Cathy has been watching me like a hawk. I see her staring at my face every few minutes. I didn't call the hospital because I figure they already have too much going on, and honestly a hospital is the last place on earth I want to be right now. I did talk to a friend who is a nurse, and she was familiar with this type pf event.
I tested my blood pressure and it is perfect: 116 over 75 with my pulse rate coming in at 50 beats per minute. I always have a nice slow heart beat. I'm generally in pretty good health right now. I've lost weight, and I've had my blood tested recently, and everything was fine. There isn't much else to tell you... I'm still very freaked out today. I walk around with a bottle of aspirin in my pocket.
I wonder if this was just a panic attack triggered by fear of covid-19? I hope that's all it was. Thanks for listening.
