On Sept 12, 2000, I went to my doctor complaining of lower back pain. which I had been experiencing for some two to three weeks. After what I thought was a thorough exam, he prescribed a medicine for kidney infection.
The next day I played 18 holes of golf and while driving home I again experienced severe lower back pain. The next morning I called the doctor and was told to come in some two hours later.
When I hung up I felt a great pain in my abdomen. like some one had hit me with a shovel. Knowing that something was terribly wrong, I had my wife drive me to the emergency room of our local hospital. Unbeknownst to me , I was bleeding to death with a burst aneurysm.
This time God was on my side as a surgical team was assembling to operate on another patient who was electively getting an aneurysm repaired. At that point my blood pressure was 230/59 . Needless to say, it was touch and go from there with the Dr giving me a 35% chance of survival.
In light of all this, I would advise anyone with extreme lower back pain to get to a vascular specialist as quickly as possible, not a general practitioner because they have to know what to look for and aneurysms are difficult to find.
After the operation ( several weeks) I started to experience severe heartburn and after an endoscopy which ruled out any ulcer or other disease it was theorized that perhaps the nerve which controls the sphincter may have been touched or irritated.
This is all greek to me , however, they prescribed Nexium which I have been on for some seven weeks and although I still experience some heartburn, it is much better, time will tell.
That's my little story, I thank God every morning that I was allowed some more time to stick around.