Erin Mims said she started having hot flashes, chest pain and a pounding heart after touching a napkin in her door handle.
Birthdays were supposed to be a day of joy, love, and—if you’re lucky—cake, but one woman’s experience in Houston turned into what she says was one of the scariest moments of her life.
According to Fox 26 News, Erin Mims was celebrating her birthday with her husband on Tuesday when she found a napkin stuck in the passenger door handle of their car as they exited a restaurant. She barely touched the napkin as she threw it away without thinking, then went back to the diner and washed her hands. After she returned to the vehicle and they left, she felt a tingling sensation in the hand with which she opened the car door.
“Could be [in] five minutes my whole arm started to tingle and go numb. I couldn’t breathe,” Mims said, Fox 26 reported. “I got hot flashes, my chest hurt, my heart was beating really fast.”
Her husband took her to a nearby hospital, where doctors performed blood tests, urine tests and a CAT scan. In a video on Facebook warning others of her experience, Mims said she spent about six and a half hours in the hospital after the incident, which began in Prospect Park.
Although there wasn’t enough of the foreign matter in her system to detect what it was, the doctor diagnosed her with “acute poisoning from an unknown substance.”
“Just that small amount would have confused me, all of you, so imagine if I had grabbed it with my full hand,” Mims said in the Facebook video. “I probably could have been dead.”
She said she was shooting the clip to tell others to “be careful” as the doctor also told her it could be a possible kidnapping attempt.
“To everyone, all the women in Houston and just everywhere, be careful when you’re gone,” she continued. “Watch your surroundings. Be careful, be safe.”
According to Fox 26, expert Mark Winter of the Southeast Houston Poison Center said the symptoms described by Sims correspond to hundreds of potential poisons, although her exposure would be considered “casual” or minimal.
While several comments on the video suggest similar scenarios have happened to other people, others claim that Mims wasn’t poisoned, but rather had a panic attack because she claimed to be a germaphobe.
“I have read some comments. I don’t care what people think,” Mims said, according to Fox 26. “I just want them to know what happened. When they see that napkin in their head, they’ll know not to touch it. I just want everyone to be careful. Physically I’m okay, but emotionally [and] mentally I am not. I don’t even want to go anywhere.”
Fox 26 reported that they had contacted the restaurant to inquire if other customers had reported similar incidents but had heard nothing.
“They’ve got some crazy people in the world, all of you,” Mims warned in the video on Facebook.
“I never thought this would happen to me or to my side of town. So it can happen anywhere,” she says. “I’m just thankful to be here.”
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