Heart-stopping moment 'I WASN'T TAKEN SERIOUSLY'

Her collapse in the bathroom was definitely not a panic attack

- Kasia De Vydt-Jillings

For months this winter, busy mum of six Casie Blakelock was feeling unwell with chest pains, shortness of breath and tingly hands.

Repeated trips to the doctors saw her prescribed three rounds of antibiotics for chest infections, then she was told it was likely panic attacks and stress.

It reached the point she had to quit her job as an executive assistant to three business managers, and even supporting her kids on the sidelines at sport was getting harder and harder.

"I like to be really present, but it was having an impact on my ability to show up,” remembers Casie, 37. “I couldn’t even walk from the car to the kids’ training fields without feeling dizzy.

“I would get up in the morning to make a coffee and have this overwhelming shortness of breath, but mentally I felt fine. It was purely physical.”

On July 30, she went back to the doctors with the same symptoms.

“The first person I saw there said she thought I was having a panic attack,” says Casie, who is mum to Kazahna, 19, Jaedyn, 18, Izzy, 17, Malakai, seven, Roman, five, and Lola, two. “It didn’t make sense because my mind was clear.”

It felt off to Casie, but she thought, “I do have a very busy life,” and if medical professionals were saying it, then perhaps mental health was behind everything she was experiencing.