"Oh I'm sorry, my battery was totally out last night. What happened?"
"Your brother was sent to hospital last night for a heart attack!!!"
.....then she broke in tears, so did I.
*****
My dearest friends,
That was the call from my sister in law a couple of months ago. The call that really hit me. Not only that it was because of what happened to my brother, but also bring back all the nightmare about heart attack. My father passed away because of this deadly disease.
When my father was in the hospital, I saw enough people in that ICCU who suffered badly because of heart problem. Surprisingly, they were not only senior people, but some of them were at my age (read: young and gorgeous! haha...). I happened to talk to a mother whose son was collapsed at home and sent to ICCU. She told me that her son was physically healthy, the cholesterol level was normal, the sugar amount was also within the range and he seemed to have a perfect body figure. So what went wrong? Can you guess?
Yeap! That was because of his stress level. The son worked as an auditor with extreme working pressure and the long working hours. I didn't know what happened with him in the end (hopefully he's doing well right now) as I left the hospital when my father passed away. But one thing for sure is that I realize that it could happen to anyone... I repeat a-n-y-o-n-e! And by that, it includes me, who have never ever managed to get the cholesterol level below the maximum point! Ya..ya... I know, I know. You might saying that it is impossible since my body posture is relatively slim, but hey... this disease does not always look at your weight!
Let us have a brief insight about this disease and how can we prevent happening to us?
Heart attack is the interruption of blood supply to part of the heart, cause heart cells to die. It mostly happened because of blockage at the coronary artery. Blockage is a plague that grows inside the artery. The artery is "the pipe" where the rich-oxygen blood is flowing to the heart. When the artery is full with plague then your heart doesn't get proper supply of oxygen. When this happens, your heart will feel very painful. Worse, it may lead to a stroke.
You might be wondering, what is that plague made of? How can it grow? Well, I read it somewhere that plague consists of fat, calcium, cholesterol and other substances in the blood. They come from various ways like smoke, high cholesterol (triglyceride is very risky for women), high level of sugar and high blood pressure. So you see? They entirely are from our way of living the life. Entirely? Not really. Some may get from family history or age.
The last two things are the factors that you can't change, but should we leave as it is our fate? Absolutely no! There are certainly many ways that we can do as prevention. Let's look at the list:
- Stop smoking
- Get more exercise
- Get heart-healthy diet
- Maintain the weight
- ...and lastly, do regular screening
I don't smoke and don't like being around one. Exercise? Well, my mood for exercise comes like my train schedule in the morning. Sometimes it comes at the very punctual time, but mostly it doesn't. Heart-healthy diet? Is seafood counted? How about milky meal? or crunchy fried snacks? That should answer your question if I'm on heart-healthy diet, doesn't it?
The more I think about the risk I have, the more I got so frightened. But being frightened is certainly not enough! Some actions have to be done and most importantly is commitment to yourself! I can't promise anything to myself but I'm feeling that a step forward to realizing that I have to change and live a more healthy lifestyle is in the making. (BTW, it's 00.30 and I'm still awake! a healthy lifestyle?? yeah, rite!).
Let your heart deserve a perfect shape to beat and simply to say... let it beat!
