# Danger, narrowly averted

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/danger-narrowly-averted/668753>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [September 13, 2013, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/danger-narrowly-averted/668753 "2013-09-13T06:29:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 7

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**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\
**Post date:** [September 13, 2013, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/danger-narrowly-averted/668753/7 "2013-09-13T16:02:19Z")

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I had an interesting close call about 2 weeks ago I almost started a thread about. My wife made me star gooseberry tea for a headache; a little later I took an isordil sublingual; later still I stood up. … Whoooo! Low blood pressure(??) I thought I was a goner. I lay down, wife asked if I wanted more star gooseberry tea _which I hadn’t connected to the sensation_. I said “Yes … wait, I’ll drink some water first.”

While drinking the water I recalled that the symptoms were similar to (but worse than) the time I had isordil a few days after a small dose of sildenafil. Using Google, I found some ambiguous comments about remedies in the same Phyllanthus genus as star gooseberry being dangerous for heart patients. (I thought about starting an IMHO thread: “I’ve learned something about Phyllanthus – is it well known?”)

Had I gone ahead and drunk some more star gooseberry tea, it might have been MUCH worse than a double dose of sedative.

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