[Skellig19]

I am quite emphatically not stupid. I have made an appointment with my doctor. Problem is it's in 2 weeks and I would love to hear if any other fat chicks have this problem to put my mind at ease.

I get sharp chest pain when I exercise. It hasn't always been this way. I started 5 months ago and go run/walking for about 30-40 minutes every weekday morning and 3 sessions of strength training + 2 weekend variety workouts (fun stuff like swimming or biking). My husband and I have been doing this together and we slowly have worked up to pretty much running a mile with 1 or 2 breaks. We feel awesome and I've dropped 50 lbs! Fabulous! Lately, though, while trying to up our endurance to running a mile with no breaks, I have started experiencing sharp chest pain that radiates to my back and then up to my throat. My breathing is fine and the rest of my body doesn't hurt that much. I've checked my pulse and beside it going rather fast because I was doing cardio, there are no other irregularities.

I have a hiatal hernia and 5 months ago I underwent a procedure to stretch out a stricture in my esophagous. These can be contributing factors, obviously.

I'm just wondering if any other ladies or men have experienced this and what they did to get past it? I have found I adore running and I really really don't want to quit! I also don't feel like I'm pushing myself too hard, just enough to build endurance but it's like my body is saying, "Nope, you're stuck at 1 mile with 2 breaks and I'm not going to do anymore! Suckah!"

[EagleRiverDee]

I have experienced chest pain that came from my stomach (I had GERD for years), sometimes severe enough to double me over in pain. I've also had chest pain from pleurisy, but you'd feel that more than just when exercising. In your position I would hold off on running and such until you get a green light from your doc, and perhaps some idea of what it is if it's not your heart. I know you've lost weight and reduced your cardiac risk, but sometimes things pop up after you lose weight. I lost 40 lbs and then all of a sudden developed knee problems, which ticked me off and felt unfair, but there you go. Hopefully this is just your stomach or esophagus- maybe a spasm in the esophagus? But I'd definitely hold off on the hard stuff until the doc's run his tests.