In July 2020, Jessica Charron, then 40, started feeling what she thought were chills and tingling from her head down her neck to her back and arms.
“It got very intense,” Charron, 43, of Hamilton, Massachusetts, tells TODAY.com. “Something was wrong.”
She went to the emergency room where she underwent testing which came back with inconclusive results. Worried that she would be sent home without treatment, Charron urged the doctors to continue testing her until they understood the cause of her symptoms. Doctors eventually concluded she was “experiencing a massive heart attack commonly known as a widowmaker.” It’s earned its name for being deadly.
“I was absolutely shocked,” Charron says. “There was nothing leading up to that which would have indicated that I would be a candidate for a heart attack.”
Strange sensations and inconclusive tests
When Charron first experienced the chills, she wondered if they started because she had spent the day outside in the heat. But as they intensified, she realized the feeling was unusual.
“I just knew something was wrong,” she says. “I felt like this is just not a normal chill — not even a flu-like chill. It was different. It was more intense.”
Her chills continued waning and returning. Each time she had a new bout it felt more severe, so she decided to go to the emergency room. While doctors ran tests, including an EKG and a CT scan, they did not see anything wrong. But Charron worried that doctors would release her and something terrible could happen later.
“I looked at the ER doctor and teared up,” she says. “I was adamant that (something was) wrong and I was so scared they were going to send me home.”
One of the emergency room doctors reassured Charron by saying “I’m not going to send you home until I try to figure out what is going on with you,” she recalls.
While Charron felt relieved she wouldn’t be going home without an answer, she noticed her symptoms were worsening.
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