The Cough Syncope (Fainting While Coughing)

 

I don’t know whether you could call it a flu or a cold, but I’ve been dogged by some kind of an illness with a persistent cough for at least a month. The severity of my symptoms has improved and worsened over the weeks, and my cough has been the cause of two fainting episodes that scared the hell out of my poor fiancée, Diana. Based on what I’ve read online, I believe my fainting episodes could be defined as “cough syncopes“. That’s when you cough so much in consecutive sequence that you lose consciousness due to restricted blood flow to the brain.

On both occasions, once I regained consciousness, and after making sure I was feeling better, Diana frantically rushed to the internet to run Google searches on such phrases as “fainting from coughing”, “lose consciousness while coughing”, and “cough syncope”. Of course, the underlying question that she was too afraid to ask was, “Is Kevin about to die?” It’s been a couple days since my last fainting episode, and I’m happy to report that I am still not quite dead. Rumors of my demise have only been slightly exaggerated, except for part about the killer ninjas. I totally fought off that mob of pissed off killer ninjas before finally collapsing to the ground from a coughing fit.

Truthfully, these coughing episodes were really scary. I woke up both times feeling disoriented and frightened, and not really sure whether I was going to come out of it okay. Gladly, it looks like I’m doing fine now. I saw my doctor last week and was prescribed a five-day antibiotic treatment. My cough had almost completely gone away after the third day. Still, these two incidents were the first time in recent memory when I ever actually fainted. Both experiences were truly surreal, and I feel a need to document each incident the same way a person might be compelled to write down everything that happened to him after a crazy, hallucinogenic drug trip. But in addition to that, maybe a recounting of my experiences will one day bring some kind reassurance to some frightened person out there frantically searching the web after learning about cough syncopes the hard way.

Incident #1: 12/29/12

I was sitting at my desk at home when things started to get bad. I had been coughing all day even despite a steady dosage of NyQuil syrup and Ricola drops, but this time was different. Have you ever noticed that you can usually identify somebody’s cough just by hearing it, because coughs generally carry a hint of a person’s speaking voice? The quality of my coughs was suddenly very different, and they hardly sounded like my own. I was wheezing and retching, and sounding increasingly foreign to my own ears as the unreplenished air rushed steadily out of my lungs. I sounded like a feeble old man choking on a throat full of dust and sand.

At first, the coughs were merely uncomfortable. But as they continued in rapid succession, I slowly began to realize that I had completely lost control. I was desperately unable to stop, and I was quickly running out of breath. Discomfort gave way to fear, and soon a feeling of genuine panic swept over me. My stomach clenched and convulsed as the coughs persisted, and I began to hunch forward in my chair.

That’s the last thing I remember before blacking out. In fact, I don’t remember losing consciousness at all. I just remember waking up from a dark, hazy void, hearing Diana’s muffled voice screaming my name. I opened my eyes and saw the underside of my desk. Then I saw Diana looking down at me with frightened concern. I had no concept of space or time. I didn’t know where I was, or how long I had been there. But aside from a feeling of slight disorientation, I felt fine. The funny thing is, I was actually a little irritable from all of Diana’s screaming. In those confusing first moments, it felt as though she had just startled me awake from a three hour nap. As it turns out, I was unconscious for no longer than ten seconds.

In the aftermath, the underside of my left cheek was sore and bruised. I had apparently hit my face on the edge of my desk before tumbling to the ground. Other than that, though, I felt fine. I was still coughing like I had the plague, but I didn’t feel much worse than when I had first woken up that morning. I even had a few drinks at the pub later that night to celebrate my friend’s birthday. Maybe that wasn’t the best idea after a cough-induced blackout, but how could I say no to Guinness, scotch, starchy food, and an opportunity to get in the birthday girl’s face to talk shit about New Jersey?

 

Incident #2: 01/15/13

Just like the previous time, I was sitting at my desk in front of my computer when the coughing started to get bad. The coughs grew violent and uncontrollable, breathing became impossible, and all of the familiar feelings of panic and helplessness came rushing back. The difference this time was that as I grew shorter of breath, each successive cough created a tinny, metallic echo inside my head. The coughing sound reverberated like a squash ball bouncing inside a narrow hall made of concrete.

I crossed the point of no return after a few more coughs, and I knew that a blackout was all but imminent. I rolled back my office chair and knelt to the floor in an effort to prevent another face plant into the desk. Then I blacked out. When I came to, Diana was shaking me and screaming my name.

“You were out for a long time,” she said. “Your eyelids were half opened, and your eyes were rolled back into your head. Are you okay?”

I didn’t have an immediate answer for her, because I was feeling very strange. My entire body was pulsing with irregular intervals, and it felt as I though I was being tapped by a dozen people wielding foam Nerf bats. I felt hot, and suddenly very constricted beneath my clothing. I took off my shirt and walked over to my leather couch to cool off. I was trembling for about two minutes before I started to feel normal again.

I didn’t feel up to another pub run that night. I did, however, find the strength to call up my friend to tell her another joke about New Jersey. Unfortunately, she was too busy to take my call because she was off somewhere either whacking a snitch, towing a car away, applying orange tanning spray to her body, or whatever the hell it is that people from Jersey do.

 

In Conclusion…

I’ve fainted twice from coughing this winter. Neither experience was very fun, but I’m glad I’m alive and well enough now to tell the tale. If you or a loved one were to ever collapse from a cough syncope, please seek immediate medical attention if something “feels wrong” for any longer than just a few minutes. Aside from that, though, if you ever find yourself in the midst of these scary circumstances, I hope you take comfort in knowing that somebody out there survived it twice within a span of nearly two weeks. Here’s to your health, my friends.