So to speak: In a blind panic

There are many ways one can feel useless. As I write this column, I have my left hand hanging limp by my side. As I type with my right hand index finger, there are series of small but sharp pains shooting up my left shoulder.
I try to be philosophical about my injury but my mind wanders away blaming many things that brought the pain. Were the heavy planks of woods I lifted tore my muscles? Or was it the lumpy pillows?
Perhaps it was the old mattress that went way past its useful days. In my despair, I went deep in my pocket and bought a new bed complete with new sets of pillows.
I was also infuriated about how casual my doctor had been. He prescribed me painkillers that did not do me any good. I woke up in the middle of the night completely disoriented with pain. Panic seized me and I bolted from my bed and walked down the stairs not knowing exactly what I was doing.
My heart raced as I clutched my arm and I started pacing up and down convinced that I was going to die. Of course I would have benefited if I stayed calm but I refused to sit down because I was afraid I was going to lose consciousness if I did.
Somewhere in the fuzziness of the confusion, I knew I needed some powerful distraction.
Anything that would keep my mind away from the pain. I looked around but there was only the television, a newspaper, and the sofas which I dare not sit. The ticking of the clock was getting louder and somehow the silence of the night was frightening. I started lifting the cushions and opening draws in a desperate attempt to find something that would divert me away from disturbing thoughts. I put my hand on the chest and the speed the heart was hammering behind my ribs was really putting the panic mode in a high gear. I thought of the telephone and the ambulance but decided I was going to give it a few more minutes. There was nothing else to do for me but to get back to the bedroom and wake up my wife. Somewhere in the deep state of confusion, I thought it was not proper for me to pass on my trouble to someone else. I was capable of sorting it out by myself and that’s where I was wrong.
I reached a hand for her shoulder and quickly snatched it back. No, I said to myself, the worse moment would pass and all I had to do was stay calm. Then a morbid thought entered my head. It was the left arm that hurt and I was having a heart attack.
I woke her up and confessed how sick I was. The first thing she did was to stop me from pacing up and down.
She asked me to relax and I took a few deep breaths. Ten minutes passed, my heart started beating normal and the blind panic disappeared to be replaced with a small anxiety.
I did the ECG the next morning and I was given an all clear but the doctor prescribed me more powerful pain killers.
They have eased the shoulder pain but I now believe that staying calm all the time helps. I was in an unfamiliar territory a few nights ago but the terrible ordeal taught me to accept sudden changes and not fight them.
It was the thought that I was helplessly pinned down with a temporary physical disability that got me in a blind panic. I take things as they come now and not even the Third World War would make me bolt from my bed in the dead of the night.