GERD is more than just simple heatburn. It can be extremely painful and cause some serious, long term problems. Now, let's hear one person's story. BET e would go and get ready to go to bed and I would go and get my pillows that I had to have under my head, and then, I would go to bed and sit there and wonde kay, am I going to get an hour’s sleep two hours sleep, before I wake up and I’m choking. It felt, literally, like someone had taken a pack of matches, and lit them, and dropped them into my esophagus and it would stay that way for hours. Morning started about five o’clock, I would get up, and I would drink coffee and that’s just like the first thing that I have to have and that was probably not the greatest thing for me at that time. During the day, I could tell that things were starting to happen. Everything I ate—pretty much—just bothered me. Whatever I did, I had heartburn all the time. When I first went to the gastro doctor I was just diagnosed with heartburn, or, I was given something for heartburn, and they didn’t know just how severe it was—at that point. BET he heartburn finally, eventually turned in to where I had reflux all the time. I knew I was sick, and I just felt like that nobody could tell me what was wrong. You know, I knew there was just a big difference in having heartburn and having Reflux, and then when it got to this. I knew that it was something serious. I didn’t know if something was ever going to help me or not. BET y daughter, at the time, was thirteen/fourteen years old, and I think that that was when she needed her mom a lot, and I just didn’t feel…I wasn’t the mother I wanted to be for her. There were several times I just felt so bad, I couldn’t get out of bed…I do think that it did cause some problems for her and myself. If I could get those years back, I would. BET hen my Reflux became so bad—I knew that there was things that were going on so I got on to the internet. I just didn’t know that much about GERD. I was amazed at the at the diseases you can get from it, in my case—pneumonia. Cancer of the esophagus is one of the big concerns. BET t takes that valve that has not closed properly and, they make it to where, now, you just have a valve that just goes down and doesn’t go back up. It was one of the very first things that I, I felt so good about, and I have ever since. I mean, that’s one thing that has totally changed my life. That morning, when I went in, I had heartburn, and I noticed the next morning, it was the first time that I had not had anything wrong in prob- in years. It’s just I can eat anything I want; I can drink as much coffee as I want. The only thing. I have a raspy voice now, and that happened from the Reflux. It’s one of the very first things that happe t burns so much for so long that you just get a real raspy voice. Having the surgical procedure to correct GERD was one of the best things I’ve done in my whole life. You know, I feel like I’m me again.