Marc Moriguchi suffered from nausea and what he called "the heartburn from hell."

"It started in my stomach and went all the way to the back of my throat. It felt like my insides were on fire."

He repeatedly pressed the button on the EKG machine, hoping for a different result. The readout was the same all three times.

"ACUTE MI SUSPECTED." Oh, no. Acute myocardial infarction. In layman’s terms: heart attack.

As a Honolulu EMS paramedic the past 20 years, Moriguchi had diagnosed and treated others with these symptoms hundreds of times. He never imagined he’d be his own patient.

"They nickname it the widow-maker," the 42-year-old Mililani resident said. "All I could think is that my wife was going to kill me."

Melissa might not get the chance if he didn’t get to a hospital quickly. Good thing he knew what to do and where to go. And that he was at work, in an ambulance.

"I popped aspirin, sprayed nitro, got hooked up to an IV and then my partner drove to the nearest cath (cardiac) lab," he said. "I knew what was going on. Could this be it, never see my family again? But then I got an overwhelming sense of peace. ‘No. This isn’t going to be my last day here.’"

That was in May. Sunday morning, Moriguchi plans to complete the Honolulu Marathon.

HE RAN cross country at Kalani High School, but after graduation in 1989, Moriguchi didn’t exercise regularly. That, and a taste for plate lunches, got him up to around 200 pounds on his 5-foot-8 frame. But he didn’t feel particularly unhealthy until that night working the graveyard shift in Haleiwa on the ambulance.

"There’s no warning," Shimamura said. "It can happen to anyone. Who knows why?"

He knew he had to make some changes; if not for himself and Melissa, then for his daughters, Kira, 14, and Tasha, 10. Interestingly, it was their doctor who set Shimamura on course to the Ward Avenue starting line Sunday.

"I took the girls to their pediatrician (Dr. Stephen Yano) one day and he said, ‘You should run the marathon with me.’"

He thought about it, and with clearance from his cardiologist, Dr. Michael Chan, Moriguchi agreed to give it a shot.

"I told him the heart attack was a message, and asked what he was going to do about it," Yano said.

With the guidance of his own doctors and Yano, Shimamura has lost 25 pounds and gotten himself into good enough shape to reasonably expect to finish the 26.2 miles.

"If I don’t run the whole thing and walk some that’s OK," he said. "If you set a high goal, even making part of that goal is a success."

Said Yano: "We’ll take it slow and run or walk whatever pace it takes to finish."

Yano, 58, is a bit of a pied piper for this event, and an inspiration himself.

"Fourteen years ago I got out of bed one morning and I was hurting so bad I knew I was going to die if I kept going without exercise," he said. "Now this is going to be my 14th marathon in a row."

And the group of friends and relatives that joins him each year grows.

"One of my goals is to take another person along for the ride every year," he said.

MORIGUCHI’S TRAINING was disrupted last month, but for a good reason. He was on the EMS Disaster Medical Assistance Team (DMAT) from here that deployed to Nassau, N.Y., to help in the wake of superstorm Sandy.

"I ran just once during the two weeks," he said. "It was too cold."

And the team was busy, helping at a hospital and filling in for area paramedics who had to take care of their own families or couldn’t get to work.

"A lot of the people there were left with nothing," Moriguchi said. "I do have some (heart) damage, but it’s minimal and I feel very fortunate."

His mentor said Moriguchi is ready.

"He’s lost so much weight and he has a great attitude," Yano said. "A switch flipped for him and he’s 30 pounds lighter. He has awareness, internal confidence and a good diet. It will be an honor to accompany him."

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783.