In her own words:

“On the 29th of March I had my first AstraZeneca COVID vaccine in the UK.

I am a usual fit and healthy 21 year old girl, that worked out 5 times a week. I was finishing my degree at the time and had all the usual flu type symptoms post vaccine which went away within a few days.

All was well until my next vaccine… June 14th, precisely 12 weeks to the day, I had my second dose of the Astra Zeneca vaccine.

Now aged 22, I had finished University and just started out at my first job. Immediately after the vaccine my mouth was flooded with a bloody, metallic taste – like I had bitten my tongue and again experienced flu-like symptoms which lasted a few days.

As the days went on I was feeling more and more lethargic and my breathing and heart rate kept spiking. July 6th rolls around and I wake up gasping for air, heart rate through the roof, sweating uncontrollably and very unsteady on my feet.

111 was phoned and an ambulance was sent straight to my house. I had a temperature of 38.9 C, pulse rate of 126, high blood pressure and a newly developed heart murmur which had shown up on the ECG.

I was then taken for my first ride in an ambulance to hospital. My stay in hospital lasted a week, I had lots of different scans and tests which they told me all came back negative – result!

However, I couldn’t get my heart rate down below 120 and still felt rubbish overall. Having just started out in my new job, I went right back to work and was again starting to feel rougher and rougher each day. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest, almost like someone was trying to break out, I was extremely dizzy and would black out when standing.

It would take me 10 mins to climb the stairs as my heart just couldn’t take it. Going from a resting heart rate of 55 to 120 is a big jump and I wasn’t too fond of it. July 29th, I was sat at my desk at work and feeling extremely rough.

I was finally persuaded by my colleagues to phone 111 and again, an ambulance was sent, this time to work. I spent another few days in hospital where the doctors looked over my tests again.

This time they found a huge amount of blood and fluid in the sack around my heart, which was somehow missed the first time.

I was diagnosed with pericarditis and PoTs. I was prescribed colchicine (an aggressive anti inflammatory) in hope it would remove my symptoms. Having reached the end of my prescription, I wasn’t feeling any better and was struggling with my heart.

New symptoms have developed over the 2 months since having my vaccine:

• Hair falling out in handfuls
• Bruising extremely easily
• Shooting/ stabbing and aching pains across chest
• Palpitations
• Heart murmur
• Breathlessness
• Joints becoming stiff
• Inability to handle hot or cold foods
• Nausea
• Shakiness/ tremors
• Dizziness
• Brain fog
• And many others

I am now waiting for a referral to a cardiology specialist and we will go from there, I was told I may have to be on beta-blockers. My life has been turned upside down since having the vaccine, I am certainly not an anti-vaxxer, like many of us, I just wanted life to go back to normal.”

Shared with permission from Aly.

Click here to read more about vaccine injuries in the UK.