It was Good Friday, 21st March 2008. I was driving my 15 year old son down to an Easter music camp in rural Victoria, so I’d booked us a motel in Wagga Wagga, on the New South Wales/Victoria border, about 450km from Sydney, so I could deliver him bright and early to the music camp on the Saturday.
The previous day, Thursday, I’d had the car serviced, and walking from the garage to my studio had been a bit tortuous. I was out of breath, had pains in my chest and felt very strange. I thought I was just unfit. At the time I was working at the computer for several hours a day, which gave me back trouble, so I’d been doing stretching exercises given to me by my osteopath. I thought the chest pains were just from overdoing the exercises. Well, that’s what I told myself. That night as I went to bed I mentioned to my wife that I was feeling odd and had these exercise-related pains in my chest. She said if you feel that way in the morning go to the doctor. But in the morning I felt OK, so off we drove. In retrospect I knew something was a little bit wrong, but didn’t want to admit it, and I had been looking forward to spending some time with my son, who was of course very into music. We listened to lots of CDs on the journey, he’d pick one and I’d pick one. We had a great trip, with, fortunately, no recurrence of the chest pains.
After we checked in to the motel, because it was Good Friday, we drove into the main street while it was still light to see what was open for dinner, as places would be closed for the public holiday. As we drove the chest pains came back, and I felt a numbness in my jaw. When we got back to the motel I told my son I was going to have a lie-down before we went for dinner. I told him about the pains. He said, with sensible wisdom beyond his years, Dad if you have pain in your jaw you might be having a heart attack. So I went to reception and asked directions to the hospital. Once I told them what was going on they took over, bless them, drove us to the hospital, where I was admitted and stayed till the following Tuesday when I was flown by air ambulance to Sydney and had a stent inserted.
The hospital staff were brilliant, with me and with my son. They bought him dinner and he stayed the night at the motel on his own – at the time he was obsessed with rugby league and there were two games on TV that night to occupy him. Of course I called my wife and she flew down the next morning and took him to the music camp.
Anyway that was 10 years ago today.
I was 54 at the time, the age my mother’s father had been when he dropped dead of a heart attack the year before I was born. My mother also had heart problems from her late fifties. When I was admitted to hospital they asked me if I smoked – no, I had given up 27 years earlier. I was skinny as I have always been i.e. not overweight. They asked about my family history, I told them and they said – that’s the cause.
Since then I’ve religiously taken my meds, and walk every morning (well, most mornings) for 30-40 minutes, avoid those cholesterol heavy foods, not that I ever ate them too much anyway, and touch wood I seem to be OK.
Thank you for listening and good health to you all.
And continued good health to you!
It was twenty years ago this year that my father died following a heart operation to fix “age and lifestyle” problems and a hole in his heart that he was born with. Unsettlingly, he was 64.
Thanks Mr a
As you may have gathered, I am now 64 – fortunately don’t have the hole-in-the-heart, but still have to deal with whatever I’ve inherited.
Good health to you too!
There’s a lot of it about. I saw my mother yesterday (for the first time in well over 20 years – let’s just say she’s ‘difficult’) in the hospital where she is waiting for a valve to be fitted. The medics will know about TAVI operations, and that’s what has been decided on because she probably wouldn’t have endured the open heart replacement which was the first procedure suggested. She’s nearly 80 and has made injudicious life decisions so it’s surprising she lasted this long.
Hope you continue to stay well Mousey.
Thanks Gatz, doing OK
I had my blood pressure checked yesterday. It was high. Not just average high, but drop-down-dead-any-moment-if-you-don’t-change-your-lifestyle high. I don’t smoke or drink to excess, but I lead a sedentary life exacerbated by an arthritic hip, am slightly overweight, with bad eating habits, and there is history of high blood pressure in my family. Back to the doc’s this afternoon to hear the worst. Wish me luck.
Good luck!
Hope everything is OK @bungliemutt and the same goes to you too @Mousey. Take care both of you.
This coming May I will have spent more time on this planet than my father did. He only got 55 years here. He died of a heart attack. I tell myself it won’t happen to me – after all, he was fat, a heavy boozer (alcoholic?), life-long smoker, had a very unhealthy diet, didn’t excercise and worked stressful shifts in a factory job he hated. I, on the other hand, swim ‘n’ gym every day, do almost feck all work, have zero stress, eat mostly fruit and veg, smoke only the occasional joint, sleep loads, gave up booze altogether a while back and am rather sexily slim. My doctor thinks none of this matters, that if my father died young of a heart attack there’s a strong possibility I may too. Silly doctor.
Let’s hope so, but at least get your cholesterol measured. Genes have a habit of having the last laugh, but there are things now available to sour their grapes.
Gary, get yourself another doctor mate. It was almost certainly the booze and especially the cigs that killed your old man. Same for mine, sudden heart attack at 61. But you’re right, it’s not something you can shrug off. I am coming up to the big 6-0 at the end of the year, and fully aware that I need to keep myself in shape and improve my diet.
Mousey, all the best mate and heres to many more years of ivory tinkling.
It must be the Pinot Gris … Here’s to your continued health @mousey – and indeed everyone here. I have several older brothers and it seems all of them have had a heart episode of some sort in recent years. I’m “only” 51 but I am worried about this kind of thing.
Ditto. Get it checked.
Big fan of statins – they will reduce your cholesterol levels quickly and have other benefits. Me to my pharmacist ‘what will happen if I don’t take my statins?’.
‘Good chance you may have a stroke’
Good enough reason to take them.
Ha! When one Mingle gives your lifestyle away. My cardiologist told me a glass of red was A Good Thing but unfortunately it doesn’t agree with me, despite my taste for a well aged South Australian Barossa Valley Shiraz or a young NZ Central Otago Pinot Noir – Sam Neill’s Two Paddocks label especially. So a nice Pinot Gris it is then – in moderation of course – hic…
That was a close shave, Mousey. So good you survived to tell the tale. Your posts here are always of the highest quality. The world would be a poorer place without you. Keep on keeping on.
Cheers Mr T
Glad you got out the other side Mousey. Your son sounds like a smart fella as well. Keep well.
Years of crew catering, motorway services, long hours and booze have probably taken their toll. I have high blood pressure (just about acceptable with meds) which my mother had yet I’m in better shape than she was when she died at a similar age (I’m 53). My dad is 89 so I’m hoping to take after him.
“Looks at biscuit tin”
Wishing continued good health to all Afterworders
I had my own brush with mortality Christmas 2013. I think I may have mentioned it here. Required 3 emergency blood transfusions after a severe reaction against meds I had been on for Crohn’s Disease for a few months. Am on different ones now and healthier, however I have some other issues and the amount of medication I am taking is increasing. I will be 56 next week, lost my dad when he was 59, he didn’t smoke or drink (for about 25 years), was pretty fit, ate reasonably well, but cancer got him.
Good health to you, Mousey, and all other Afterworders.
My dad had a heart attack and died at 52 but he was overweight, diabetic, a smoker, no exercise, big drinker.
I always smugly assumed that I would generally be OK (you try and control what you can control), even though high cholesterol runs in the family. But at 49 my cholesterol is high- the doc wouldn’t normally medicate at my levels but I am now on statins due to family history. I don’t drink, healthy weight, vegetarian, exercise a lot, but those dratted genes….
Keep well, everyone.
Lovely post, Mousey – a reminder that every day is to be celebrated.
Glad to hear you’re still well Mousey.
I had a heart attack 8 years ago, aged 48. No signs it was coming, and I’d always kept
reasonably fit, or so I thought. However there is a history of heart disease in my family. I’d been to see my doctor the day before it happened, for something totally unrelated and saw a poster in the waiting room which showed an exaggerated tight belt around someone’s chest with a caption saying something like “If you feel the belt tightening, it’s time to call an ambulance”.
Fast forward about 10 hours, and I wake up in the middle of the night for a wee. On my way back to bed I feel a bit nauseous, and guess what – like a belt’s being tightened around my chest.
I called an ambulance. The marvellous paramedics who attended gave me an ECG in my living room, and confirmed I was indeed having a heart attack.
30 minutes later, I’m in hospital having a stent fitted.
Luckily, due to my prompt treatment, I sustained very little long term damage to my heart.
I’m forever grateful that I saw the poster in the doctors waiting room.
And that I always have a big slurp of water before bed.
The Afterword – trending towards the Afterlife…
So I had a liver ultrasound today. Who knew they did those? I have a fatty liver (I prefer to think of it as Fois gras) and gall stones. Apparently. And elevated cholesterol, something about my blood sugar is pre-diabetic, and of course the docs want me to lose the weight they have been nagging about since I was 35. Given that I am adopted and therefore have no genetic history, I suppose I have to take these things seriously.
I take my advice from Warren Zevon (“avoiding the doctor for 40 years was a strategic mistake”) and enjoy every sandwich.
Here’s health to us all.
Hopefully not Warren Zevon’s ‘I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead’ advice though. Enjoy every reduced fat sandwich.
Er, no.
“Send lawyers, guns and money” Is one I’ll keep in reserve too.
I think this is the one which sums up the thread https://youtu.be/LbhYqV17CoQ
Yup