Water pump just died...I think

So I was driving to work and I started to loose heat then the temperature shot up...I saw it when the needle was at about 3/4 and shut it off.

Now I'm sitting, waiting for the tow truck.

My question is has anyone had a similar issue, and should I worry about the head gasket?

Typically if you catch the car prior to a full over heat you're safe.

Judging by your description of shutting her down when you did, i would say your safe. Its the guys who are like "well my house is only a few more miles away, ill just keep driving it" that end up with a warped head and tears when they need a new engine, or fix the broken one. Cast iron blocks definitely have more tolerance but our aluminum M54s dont like getting too hot at all. As far as your issue goes, its usually the thermostat that goes first in the cooling system, but when it happened to my car it was stuck open so the car would not warp up completely. Seems like yours may be stuck closed so there was no coolant flowing anymore, which would make sense since you said your heater was cooling down and than would happen if the heater core wasn't getting hot coolant anymore.