So, here's the not so fun story:
Woke up on a Wednesday (July 22) and within 15min I knew something was wrong. Short of breath and pain in my chest. I figure some sort of heart attack. I Google (funny, right?) the symptoms as its getting worse and realize the pain is on the R side and not radiating. At that point I wake up my wife and call 911. Fire dept shows up, determines it's not heart but definitely not good. As May70 says, it's painful as hell. Like fall down and crawl around speechless painful. I really thought I might die. Now I go for a 4:30am ambulance ride.
Get to the ER, the pain isn't as crushingly bad, but still not nice. X-ray shows the the R side is 100% flat. Well no wonder it feels so bad, when it's that far gone, there is sideways pressure on your heart.
As they put in a chest tube I almost pass out, then WOW I feel better as soon as they pull a vacuum. Like amazingly better.
First step is to keep the vacuum on for 24hrs then seal the line and test over the next 24hrs for any leaking. Well I end up leaking, dammit.
Next step is CT scan, and find out where the blebs are. (My kids think that's a funny word, I agree)
Blebs are found and it's off to laproscopic surgery. They cut them out, staple the lung holes, and stick the lung to the inside of my chest cavity by roughing the surface up. Yes, it was sore for a while.
Then 24hrs on vacuum and 24hrs off to leak test. This time I pass. Then it's follow up x-rays and those look good.
6 days in the hospital and I'm home on light duty.
The follow up x-ray a week later looks good so I'm cut loose and feeling better.
At this point now, I'm mostly normal with some muscle tightness where the holes were thru my ribs but overall OK. Breathing is 90% and getting better.
As far as a cause, the docs told me the same thing. Random for thin frame white guys. One doc said he used to see this fairly frequently with college kids in Boulder hitting the bong a little too hard
The only thing I can think may have done it for me was a 5min exposure to catalyzed paint on the previous friday. My buddy was painting a steering column for me in his booth and I was in there for a little bit. The booth was on and I had my covid mask on. Barely smelled the fumes, but maybe that got it going?? One other guy I work with had the same thing happen to him with 2-part car paint years ago so... no 2-part painting for me. EVER. If I use anything else (rattle can) I put on a super filtered and powered full mask system or I don't do it.