a veritable Heart Attack Chili

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PiquantePilot

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About a month ago, I made a batch of chili. A pretty awesome one, I had thought. I was diving into it pretty heavily it was so yummy. No one else at home was because they had bad stomachs or the flu at the time. 'Yeah, all the more for me.'
So after 2 days of a regular diet of this, I woke up in the morning with a heart that seemed to be flopping around in my chest. I had no other symptoms, just this uncomfortableness which I found through the day that I could ignore if I stayed busy. No clue what it was. Soon, I was thinking "I am going to have to get this checked out, #&@-it". That evening it did not improve and my heart rate was up; about 100. So I google tachycardia and it says afib is one cause. I know enough that afib is not something to ignore & I know an EMT and they gladly agree to do an ecg.
We get me shaved, hook up some leads and run a tape.
At the top it screams "ATRIAL FIBRILLATION" and other things like irregular rhythm - and the trace is pretty wild (I've had many done in the past for physicals etc and have the textbook 'slow then fast normal rhythm'; no pvcs/blocks/certainly no afib).
So I go home, take an aspirin and we are trying to decide, 'rush to the hospital', see GP on Monday, see cardiologist in 2 weeks (I was leaning to the first one).
And all this time I was thinking with great dread, there goes my career and hobby, "what will I keep busy with after I sell all my aviation stuff, g-d it"
About this time I recall to myself an instance where I had a rapid heart rate, high BP and anxiety maybe 8 years earlier and it passed pretty quickly; but I recalled reviewing my diet at the time - and home-made chili had been a recent meal so we'd considered that as a possible cause. Probably forgot about it the next day.
I got to reviewing the recent chili formulation and I remembered dumping a huge load of HandiPac Chili Powder into this recent batch of chili because I was not tasting well after a recent cold and wanted to pump it up. I really dumped it in; maybe 1/4 cup to a...1 qt batch?
Anyway it was wayy more than I normally would use. And I was really liking it so I was eating 2 meals a day of it. I looked up what chili powder is - capsicum - then did a search for I think; capsicum poisoning and found a paper on the NIH (nat. instit of health) in which a young guy was dieting and taking these weight loss pills containing capsicum. He had afib AND MI's because of it! Although, he did recover fully.
So I am pretty sure I had made a true Heart Attach Chili and was suffering from the effects of capsicum poisoning. All my symptoms abated in 24 hours, I tossed the chili and the seasoning. I discussed it with a cardiologist and he agreed with all this. My ecg is fine now.
So, no more chili for me, I am sticking with bland foods for a while! Y'all be careful in the kitchen, it can affect your health and thus, your flying.
 
Interesting. I had always been under the impression that capsaicin is healthy due to its antioxidant properties. You must’ve had an excessive amount or may have a sensitivity to it. Glad you’re okay!
 
A high salt intake as well as caffeine can cause irregular heart beats as well. That chili powder may have had a load of salt in it. Drinking a lot of Gatorade/Powerade and spitting bags of sunflower seeds can do the same (sodium imbalance I’m guessing).
 
A heart attack does not necessarily end a flying career.

At the time, I did not care one bit about flying again because the thought of flying with my own wings and a harp had me pretty skeered...
 
Sorry for your ordeal, but am I the only one disappointed we didn’t get a recipe?
 
Sorry for your ordeal, but am I the only one disappointed we didn’t get a recipe?
1. Kidney beans
2. Chili sauce
3. 1 gallon of extra spicy chili seasoning.
4. 12 cups of sea salt
 
Sooo did your cardiologist review your EMT’s ekg and confirm you had gone into Afib or was the machine reading it wrong and you were just in a SVT??? If it was truly a fib then you have PAF (paroxysmal atrial fibrillation). That is not just a brush it off “I ate too much hot stuff” problem. It would normally require more workup. Not all runs of PAF are symptomatic. Could lead to a stroke or embolism.
 
Need to throw in a few Carolina Reapers!

images
 
may a chili stress test will replace the treadmill stress test!
 
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