Many years ago, when I was a runner, I had a heat stroke. I suddenly became very hot, an accelerated heating that began in my core and spread rapidly throughout my body. My head began to throb mercilessly, and I was sure I was going to pass out and not wake up.
Today, I was outside working in my hobby yard when it happened again, suddenly, without any warning. One minute I was raking sand and the next I was SICK and thought I was going to faint. It took me a bit to figure out I was really, really hot--and put the hot with the faintness and the pounding headache, but when I did, I dropped the rake and made my way as quickly as I could into the garage and into the house, where I went directly into the shower, turned on the water, and began cooling my core.
That helped, but so did the cool water I drank straight from the shower head. I was nauseous, faint, and holding my head against the pounding pain. It took about 5 minutes before I felt cooled off enough to wrap up in a towel and hit the sheets. Within an hour, I was cooler and calmer, but still did not feel well.
I was meeting a friend for lunch and seemed well enough 2 hours later to go to the restaurant, but when I walked inside, the room was really warm--and I started getting sick again! We picked up our place settings and went outside, where the combination of shade and a slight breeze were much more comfortable than the closed-in room. I took an Aleve for the headache that returned with a vengeance, but could not order a meal as my stomach was heaving. Even the wheat toast didn't sit well, so I only ate 1/2 slice, but drank a lot of liquid.
I turned down the air conditioning when I came back home, stayed inside, and drank fluids until it was time to teach my night class. It went well and I feel okay now, but ugh!
I'll stay inside tomorrow, even though it wasn't that warm today and I didn't feel at all uncomfortable or hot before the heat stroke hit. Perhaps I had depleted my electrolytes and just didn't know it.
Believe me, it's nothing something anyone in their right mind would do deliberately because heat stroke can be not just dangerous, but deadly. I'll heed the warning and not put myself into a situation for a repeat performance.
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The plan was to take Mia for a walk this morning; however, the moment I stepped outside, my head started throbbing, so I turned around and came back in. Guess I'll take it easy for a couple of days and see if the symptoms fade.
Yeah, I'm already drinking lots of fluid, wearing loose clothing, and taking it easy: I have a stack of papers left to grade for Thursday's class.
Tomorrow, I take the car in for servicing, including trying to fix the driver side door as once it goes down, it won't come back up. While the car is being worked on, I'll take in a movie at a near-by theater, and everyone knows how COLD theaters keep the auditoriums!
I should be fine by the end of the week.
Take it easy!
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