MY HEALTH EXPERIENCEBERNARD SHERIDAN: Heart attacks have made me realise I'm not bulletproof
IT ALL happened so quickly. One minute I was driving to visit my sister in Cavan and a short while later, I found myself in a hospital theatre having three stents put into my heart.
I was driving alone in my van on April 1st last when I started to feel what I thought was an indigestion pain in my chest. It was a horrible sensation and I couldn’t shake it. Then water started running down the back of my neck like a cold sweat and I started to feel really unwell.
The pain became severe and I got a crampy, deadened sort of feeling down my arm and, at that stage, I turned back home towards Glasnevin. I knew I had never experienced anything like this before, but still thought it was something I had eaten. I completely missed my exit and ended up out on the Malahide Road heading in the direction of where I was born. I was totally disorientated.
When I went around a roundabout the wrong way, I realised I better get off the road before I killed somebody. I parked up the van and hailed a taxi to take me to Beaumont Hospital which was the closest hospital. At this stage, I was in a pretty sad state.
When I got to the emergency department, I told the girl on admissions I thought I was having a heart attack and I was brought straight into triage where the doctor who checked me agreed that I was.
I was wheeled into the resuscitation room where they gave me anti-clotting agents, but they didn’t work and I was getting worse and worse.
It was a Friday evening and the theatres were closed, but one of the surgeons agreed to come in and do a procedure on me. He went in through my wrist, cleared the blockage in the arteries on the left side of my heart and put three stents in.
I was in so much pain at that stage, it was all a blur. The pain had moved up around my jaw and I had become very cold, but when the surgeon cleared the blockage, it felt like somebody had poured lukewarm water from the top of my body down. It was a very welcome feeling.
The surgeon wanted to go back and have a look at the right side of my heart once I had time to heal and recover.
I was at home recovering when I took another attack on April 18th. I knew straight away as soon as I started getting the sensation down my arm and chest that it was the beginning of another heart attack.
This time, I didn’t mess around, but got my wife to drive me straight to the Mater which is the closest hospital to our house.
They didn’t waste any time at the Mater in bringing me to theatre. The surgeons went in and found a blockage on the right side of my heart which they cleared and put in a stent.
It was a very dramatic experience having one, never mind two heart attacks so close together. I think it was more upsetting for my family because I just went into a kind of shock mode. We have three young children, aged three, seven and nine, so it was very hard on my wife.
I know myself if I had got a bit of relief after the first attack in the van, if the pain had let up at all, I would have put it down to indigestion and never mentioned it to anybody or gone to see a doctor. It’s the way us Irish men are, you have to be half dead before you get yourself checked out.
My brother was murdered a few years ago in Dublin and a few months later, my mother died of a heart attack at the age of 73. I genuinely believe she died of a broken heart. The stress of losing my brother and mother so suddenly in such a short space of time has taken its toll on me. I also have type 2 diabetes and high cholesterol and have been a smoker all my life.
My confidence was totally gone after the second heart attack. Your heart is something that you take for granted will just keep ticking away inside you all your life. I was feeling scared, weak and vulnerable when I started the cardiac rehab programme at the Mater which I only finished in August.
I can’t praise the cardiac rehab team enough, they are so committed. It feels like you’re on your own until you get under the care of these people. They monitor you very closely all the time and slowly advise you to push yourself just a little bit more until you gain a bit more confidence. They also give advice on diet, exercise and stress management.
As I am on so much medication including statins, beta blockers and blood thinners, I’m going to have to change my line of work. I’m a painting contractor and I wouldn’t be safe up a ladder. I’m going to have to try to reinvent myself.
Having the heart attacks has made me realise that I’m not bulletproof and I would urge other men to try to avoid a heart attack at all costs. It’s a life-changing event, I’m going to be on tablets for the rest of my life. My situation is not unique. I never believed this could happen to me at the age of 48, but it did.
If you sense at all that something is wrong with your health, don’t put it on the long finger as we men tend to do. Go to see your doctor and get checked out.
LIFE ON THE LINE: DON’T DIE OF EMBARRASSMENT – CALL 999
Every year in Ireland, about 6,300 people suffer a heart attack, but it is estimated that only half of these cases will present to hospital by ambulance.
Figures from the Central Statistics Office show that 83 per cent of premature deaths from heart attack under the age of 65 occur in men, which is equal to five men dying prematurely every week or a total of 274 premature male deaths annually.
The Irish Heart Foundation's booklet, A Mans Guide to Heart Health, supported by the HSE, has positive steps to prevent a heart attack. Free copies of the booklet are available at tel: 1850-364364.
If you are worried about heart or stroke problems, talk to an Irish Heart Foundation nurse in confidence Monday to Friday, from 10am to 5pm, at tel: 1890-432787.
In conversation with MICHELLE McDONAGH
