Friday, June 11th is St. Mary’s RedDAY!

Heart Disease is a leading cause of death for Canadians.  Yet, most are unaware they may be at risk or when to seek care.

RedDAY is an opportunity to come together as a community to raise awareness of this serious health risk and how it can be prevented. 

You can make a difference.

Wear RED in support, post images with #RedDayFriday, and visit redday.ca to register and support St. Mary’s Regional Cardiac Care Centre.

 

Dianne’s Story

“I thought I had a virus. I was not afraid at the moment of my heart attack; I didn’t think that I was dying because I didn’t know the signs. “

 

 

I would have thought that I would have had pain in my arm. I would have thought I would have had pain just on the one side. It was right across. I knew for the first time in my life, I had no control of what was going to happen.

 

My name is Diane, Andernacht. I am born and raised in good old Cambridge and I am 50 years old and little did I know that I was starting to have, I guess, symptoms of heart disease issues. That happened for a few months, but I blamed it all on, you know, my age, I was 45. I thought I was going through my changes, so I didn’t think anything of it.

 

The week before, I play hockey on Saturdays with my husband, I was out playing ice hockey and I had a shift, came back off the ice and I was like extremely exhausted. I was winded and I can remember feeling a knot right here. And then four days prior to my heart attack I started having shooting pains on my chest. They were short and quick, so I kind of ignored it. The night before I jumped out of bed and I felt it, it was a little more pressure than the ones that I had previously felt. And then, then I remember thinking, wow, I really have to call my doctor on this. And then the day of, I got up, got ready to go to work, went in the kitchen, made my breakfast and sat at the table. And then that’s when it really hit it. Jolted me out of my chair. When I look now and see the symptoms, mine was just right across my chest. The other symptoms, like the wanting to vomit, wanting to defecate that those were not like signs that I would think would be a heart attack. And then the sweating, it was dripping off me. I remember sitting down like thinking, wow, I’m really sick. Cause again, I thought I had a virus. I was not afraid at that moment of my heart attack, that I thought I was dying, because I didn’t know the signs. So I wasn’t worried.

 

At that point I got up and went up the stairs and I couldn’t open the door to the bathroom. I didn’t make it. Like I was exhausted by the time of going up the stairs and what just happened. So I threw myself onto the spare bed cause the door was open and that’s where I called for my husband. And he came over and I just said, you know, I think I need to go to the hospital. So I went to Cambridge hospital on the Thursday. Well I had an ECG and blood work, within an hour I was told, yeah, it’s a heart attack. WE have you on call for an angiogram St. Mary’s. You’re not going home. When they did the angiogram that I needed a triple bypass. I was floored. Totally floored. I wasn’t scared. I was just more like, okay, let’s figure this out. Let’s get it done. Fix me. I want to go back to normal. That was my focus. Cause I couldn’t allow myself to get worried or panicked. And I knew I was in good hands. I just cried because I thought this is a life changer and there’s nothing I could do.

 

One of the nurses would come in to explain to me what I needed to expect for my surgery and also explain how to use the pillow to roll out of bed and all that, because I was not allowed to put pressure on my chest, but on my abdomen. And I was excited about that. Cause I thought I’d have good abs at the time this was done. I thought great. And then she said, as far as the surgery, she goes, she got really calm and looked at me right in the eye and said, you need to trust us. We do two to three surgeries a day. We are professionals, trust us. She kept saying, trust us. And I’m thinking, okay. And she goes, we are going to make you stand up after your surgery. We’re going to come in when you wake up and ask you to stand up, just trust us. And I looked at my husband and I remember saying, okay, I’m okay. I got to trust them.

 

So its the day of the surgery and my whole family shows up just waiting for a doctor Ash to show up. And then he does. And he taps me on the head and it says, hi what’s your name? I said, Dianne Andernacht, and he’s like, what are you here for? And I said a boob job. And they all burst out laughing. And I said, Hey, if I had a choice right now, that’s what I’d be doing. But at that point I felt so good because everybody laughed and I’m like, okay, now you can do it.

 

And next thing I knew I woke up in recovery, but I remember them making me stand up. And I remember thinking I got to do it. And I stood. And then when they let me down, I was like, Oh wow. I did it. I stood, I was determined. I was going to do it because I wanted to go back to normal. I just wanted to play my sport.

 

But my first thing of ball hockey, I tell you, that’s when I realized how sick I was previously and had no idea because I could run from end to end. And I still had so much energy. Like I could breathe. That was the biggest thing.

I don’t have patience for tolerance of certain things because I know how life can change. So I try to appreciate things. I try to look at that the best of things. I probably drive my nieces and nephews crazy because I don’t have children. They are my children. So I probably hug them more than they really want to right now. And they’re in their early twenties, late teens. The last thing you want is your aunt coming over to squeeze your cheeks and stuff. But you know what, that’s what, that’s what I live for. My husband and my nieces and my nephews.