My School Nurse Told Me I Was “Faking It”… Then My Heart Stopped In The Hallway

The Heart Stops and the Fight to Breathe Again

I silenced the notification and headed to AP English, wondering if maybe she was right. Maybe I was just anxious; maybe I’d convinced myself I was sick.

Except the symptoms had started before I’d even noticed the watch warnings. The chest tightness came first, then the dizziness, then I’d checked my watch and seen the concerning data.

But Nurse Campbell was the medical professional. She’d done this for 18 years; surely she knew better than a scared teenager with a smartphone.

I tried to focus on the discussion of symbolism in The Great Gatsby, but my heart kept doing that stuttering thing that made me lose my breath. Fourth period was world history with Mr. Brennan, who had a policy against phones or smartwatches being visible during class.

I kept my watch face covered by my sleeve, but I could still feel it buzzing against my wrist with notifications I wasn’t allowed to check. The room felt too hot; my shirt collar felt too tight.

I loosened my tie and unbuttoned the top button, trying to breathe deeper, but the pressure in my chest just kept building. Mr. Brennan was talking about the Treaty of Versailles when my vision started doing this weird tunnel thing, like I was looking through a paper towel tube.

I gripped the edge of my desk trying to ground myself, telling myself this was just anxiety, like Nurse Campbell said. Anxiety couldn’t actually hurt you; it just felt scary.

I just needed to calm down and breathe, except breathing was getting harder. Each inhale felt shallow, insufficient, like my lungs couldn’t quite expand all the way.

My heart was hammering now, fast and irregular, and I could feel it in my throat, in my temples, in my chest.

“Yo, you good? You’re really pale.” The kid sitting next to me, Leo something, leaned over and whispered.

I nodded, not trusting my voice, not wanting to cause a scene over what Nurse Campbell had assured me was just anxiety. Leo didn’t look convinced.

“Mr. Brennan, I think Kieran needs to go to the nurse.” Leo raised his hand.

Mr. Brennan looked up from his lecture notes, saw my face, and his expression changed immediately.

“Kieran, yes, go. Do you need someone to walk with you?” He asked.

I shook my head and stood up too fast. The room tilted.

I grabbed my backpack and made it to the doorway before everything started spinning. The hallway was empty, everyone in class, fluorescent lights buzzing overhead.

I leaned against the lockers trying to steady myself, but my legs felt wrong, disconnected, like they belonged to someone else. My watch was going crazy against my wrist: buzz after buzz after buzz.

I pulled my sleeve up to look at it. “Heart rate 203 BPM. Irregular rhythm. High heart rate alert.”

I pressed my hand against my chest and felt my heart racing, skipping beats, racing more. This wasn’t anxiety; something was actually wrong.

I needed help. I needed to get back to Nurse Campbell and make her understand that this wasn’t in my head.

I took two steps toward her office and my heart just stopped. Not slowed down, not skipped a beat—stopped.

I felt it happen, this horrible empty sensation in my chest where the beating should be, and then everything went black. I don’t remember hitting the floor, don’t remember the impact or the sound or anything.

The next thing I knew, I was looking up at the ceiling tiles, but I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything except stare up at the fluorescent lights while my body seized and jerked without my permission. Somewhere far away, someone was screaming.

“Call 911! Get the nurse! Oh my god! Oh my god! Someone help him!” Feet were running, voices shouting.

I tried to tell them I was okay, tried to move, but nothing worked. My body was doing its own thing, convulsing on the floor while I was trapped inside watching it happen, but unable to control anything.

Then there were hands on me, someone rolling me onto my side, someone else yelling about seizures. Except I wasn’t having a seizure; my heart had stopped.

Why didn’t they understand? My heart had stopped.

Nurse Campbell’s face appeared above me, and even through the fog and the confusion and the terror, I saw the exact moment she realized she’d made a catastrophic mistake. Her face went white.

Her hands shook as she felt for a pulse in my neck.

“No pulse. No breathing. Someone time this, start timing now!” She yelled.

She began chest compressions, pressing down on my sternum with the heel of her hand, counting out loud.

“1, 2, 3, 4.” Each compression sent shock waves through my body.

I could feel it happening but couldn’t respond, couldn’t tell her I was still in here, still conscious somehow despite my heart not beating. More people arrived.

A teacher I didn’t recognize took over compressions when Nurse Campbell’s arms got tired. Someone else was on the phone with 911, reading off our school address.

A student was filming everything on their phone, the camera pointed right at my face. I wanted to tell them to stop, to give me some dignity, but I couldn’t speak.

Then suddenly I could breathe. One second nothing, the next my lungs pulled in air with a horrible gasping sound that didn’t seem like it came from me.

My heart stuttered back to life, beating wrong, arrhythmic and chaotic, but beating. Nurse Campbell’s face was above me again, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Stay with me. Ambulance is coming. You’re going to be okay. Just stay with me.” She sobbed.

I tried to tell her I wasn’t going anywhere, that I was right here, but my mouth wouldn’t form words. The world was starting to make sense again, sounds becoming clearer, my body responding to my brain’s commands again.

I could wiggle my fingers, could feel the cold floor beneath me, could hear the approaching sirens getting louder and louder until they were right outside. And then paramedics were rushing through the school doors with equipment and urgent voices.

They cut my shirt open right there in the hallway, stuck electrodes all over my chest, and attached me to a monitor that started beeping frantically.

“V-fib! He’s in V-fib! Charging to 200!” One of the paramedics, a woman with gray hair pulled back in a ponytail, looked at the screen and her eyes went wide.

I didn’t know what V-fib meant, but I knew from her tone it was bad. Another paramedic held something that looked like paddles.

“Clear!” The gray-haired woman counted.

My body arched off the floor as electricity shot through me. The monitor beeped differently.

“Still in V-fib. Charging to 300. Again. Clear!” She shouted.

Another shock. This time I felt it, this horrible sensation of my chest exploding and contracting at the same time.

The monitor changed its pattern.

“Sinus rhythm. We got him back. Let’s move!” She announced.

They loaded me onto a stretcher and ran toward the ambulance. The gray-haired paramedic was squeezing a bag connected to a mask over my face, forcing air into my lungs.

I saw the crowd of students lining the hallway, phones out filming, faces shocked and scared. I saw Mr. Brennan standing there with his hand over his mouth.

I saw Leo, the kid who’d noticed I was sick, crying openly. I saw Nurse Campbell standing frozen in her office doorway watching them take me away, her scrubs stained with my blood from where she’d done chest compressions so hard she’d broken my skin.