I remember the first time I had heartburn acutely.

I was living alone for the first time, and playing roller derby.  I remember waking up in the middle of the night with a painful, firelike feeling in my chest that was not passion, ardor or anything pleasant.  It hurt.  A lot.  I thought I might be in serious trouble.  Maybe I'd fallen wrong and had one of those injuries that take a while to pop up.  It was the early hours of the morning and while I was in physical pain, it wasn't unbearable.  I decided to google my symptoms and see if I could self-diagnose to either decide if I merited an emergency room visit or if I could wait and make an appointment.

After reading and rereading I decided I might have heartburn.  Since my dad pops antacids like candy, my mom had stocked my medicine cabinet to supply a small drug cartel I dug out some antacids, chewed the chalky pills and sat on my couch watching Bravo until - the pain went away.

Traumatized, I dreaded having heartburn ever again.

I'm sharing this memory because I woke up Sunday morning with heartburn.  I thought I was sick to my stomach.  I thought I was about to throw up, except I also felt like someone was driving a hot poker through my chest.  I decided I might have heartburn.  So again I relied on those antacids my mother stocked me with - and after a few minutes checking twitter I was ready to go back to bed.

So there's a funny story for you.  Now I'm going to schedule this and go to bed!