Hello,
I am a new member, and this is my first post. I'm 28, and I'm pretty sure I have GERD, but I will be completely sure after I have my endoscopy with Bravo this Thursday. I wanted to share my story, and the anxieties that I am feeling about this. Compared to some, my road to this point hasn't been that long, but it's been frustrating none the less. It started in May of this year, around the same time I started a very stressful new job, and was having lots of stress and anxiety. I felt this awful lump in my throat and lots of post nasal drip and that tight heaviness in my chest. Then my stomach started feeling weird, and I got chest pains, and I thought I must have and ulcer and one day, I got really panicky and went to the urgent care. They did the EKG's, Xrays, and everything was normal. They said my stomach was probably just inflamed and gave me aciphex, which helped the chest and stomach pain, but the awful lump in my throat, the congestion, and the scratchiness never went away. Some days it was so bad, I would panic and think I was having an asthma attack, but the doctors told me I didnt have asthma. My regular doc gave me bunches of allergy meds that didn't work, then I went to an ENT and had allergy testing, which was all negative and that was when he told me it was GERD. He put me on 40 mg protonix, and told me to give it 3 months, and to stop eating all the trigger foods. I cut it all out, and started writing everything I ate down and how I felt. I gave it 9 weeks, but it seemed to get worse, not better. My regular doc said I should have noticed a difference by then, so he told me to try combining it with Nexium. Taking both of them made me feel almost drunk. I felt dizzy, and spaced out, so I stopped with the Nexium and went back to the protonix alone. He also tested me for the h-pylori which was negative. I'd started having the actual heartburn again, a bad sour taste, and chest pain, even after the blandest thing I ate, and a couple weeks ago, after a sleepless night of heartburn pain, my regular doc got me a referral to the GI doc. I saw him 2 weeks ago for my introductory consultation, and he recommended the endoscopy and Bravo that I will have this week. I have anxiety, and I am so scared of this procedure, and of what he will find. I feel like I already have a lump in my throat and chest tightness, is it going to be even harder to breathe and eat with a Bravo thing attached to my esophogus?!? Will it hurt? I need some reassurance and does anyone else have this awful congestion in their chest and throat? Thank you.