Last updated on March 1, 2021
What in the actual f**k 2021?!? Covid, then a heart attack?
Heres the dealio; On Friday (2/26) I was headed back from the grocery store and I felt some pain in my chest. A good dull throb right in the middle of my sternum. I thought it was weird but I figured it would go away in a bit. I got home and it got worse. All I could think was that maybe some delayed post-Covid thing was going on.
20 minutes later I was on the phone with Kristin telling her I’d better get to the ER. After using the magic password of “chest pain” through 2 levels of triage I was hooked up to an EKG machine.
The next thing I knew I had 2 nurses and 3-4 techs swarming. One of the nurses said.. “ok, so things are going to happen very fast.”
Over the course of the next hour I was carted off to the cath lab, informed I was having a heart attack, had some scans done and some light manscaping. Next I had a line punched into my femoral artery to access and remove a blockage and deploy a stent. The official deal, an acute ST elevation myocardial infarction (stemi) due to occlusion of circumflex coronary artery. Short Version: A heart attack.
Holy shit. WTF?
I didn’t have time to be scared.
I didn’t have time to be worried.
I didn’t have time to think about my Dad who died of a heart attack at 59 described in a similar way on Christmas Eve 2009, or another friend my age who passed just last year in an almost identical scenario.
It was just go-go-go and get this thing fixed.
Had this happened during the few times in my life where I was engaging in nutritional dumbassery on a regular basis it would have made sense. But seriously, who in the absolute f**k drops 50lb and THEN has a heart attack. Well, apparently me.
Whether it’s just genetics, shitty luck, or the sins of the past coming home to roost. No matter how much it shouldn’t have been, it was the reality.
The real takeaway is: LISTEN TO YOUR BODY
I heard from multiple folks at the hospital, including the cardiologist that this was a widow-maker in the making. Had I tried to ride it out I wouldn’t be here. Don’t f**k around with chest pain.
What now?
For those of you who don’t know me, I’ve always been a big guy. There really hasn’t been a time in my life where I didn’t need to lose a few more pounds but after recently losing 50lb over the course of the last 10 months or so I was feeling pretty good about things. 6 days a week of 45 minutes of fitness and a solid diet is part of my routine. I’m talking about tracking all my food. Eliminating most sugar and processed foods with cheat meals once every couple of weeks. Not the “I eat good most of the time” lie that is told with reckless abandon.
Hell, the previous two days I had done HIIT cycling classes, lifted and ran a few times, all the while feeling pretty damn good about myself. That’s why this event came as such a shock. I was planning the evening’s workout while a widow-maker was manifesting in my chest.
So here we go. What do we do now? I’m sitting here in a hospital bed, waiting for my discharge papers, instructions and prescriptions to see how to keep this train rolling and square shit up more than I already have. It would be one thing to point at obvious misbehavior and say that’s it, but I’ve eliminated the egregious behavior. This is going to take some thinkin’.
I’ve got a good handle on what to do, good friends to inspire me who are already walking the path. This is a warning shot of epic proportions and I will regard it as such.
Will I stop lifting, hell no. I’ll be back at some point but I’ve to to talk to the doc and get a plan together. This is a limitation I will work around but there are plenty of ways to make progress without hoisting stacks of iron. #theobstacleistheway
Moving forward you’ll probably see more heart healthy options on the recipes category and a few less heavy circus tricks on the ‘gram. Cheers y’all… I ain’t goin’ nowhere.
