Carol Katz with daughter Jennifer Blaney Photo by Ben Hicks

A heart attack waiting to happen.

Looking back, Carol Katz now knows how closely she fit the oft-used saying. Both of her parents died of heart disease. A self-described Type A personality, Katz for much of her adult life held a high-tech job in San Francisco that was also high in both pay and stress.

She was raising a daughter on her own. She was a two-pack-a-day smoker and overweight. And she never questioned her doctor much about her health, let alone her heart.

Then, in late November of 2005, after losing her job, having to move several times and going through a whirlwind romance that ended badly, Katz suffered her first heart attack. She was 53. She had her second two days later, while in the hospital. She has since had another heart attack, undergone a five-way heart bypass, had a pacemaker put in and has faced exhaustive stress tests and dozens of doctor visits. More are ahead.

“I’ve been told she’s a ticking time bomb,” daughter Jennifer Blaney, 22, says of Katz and the chances of another heart attack. “It’s not a matter of if, but when.”

Since age 16, Blaney has been her mother’s nearly full-time caregiver and has handled complicated insurance and financial matters that often arise amid health crises. Still, they talk in frank rather than fragile terms about Katz’s still-dicey health. The two, who share a small home in Columbia, even find some humor in what they’ve been through in the last six years.

They quip about the times Blaney had to convince her mother in the middle of the night that she needed to get to a hospital. And laughter erupts over the time Blaney found her mother flat on the floor and feared the worst, until the resting Katz opened her eyes.

Katz also talks in hopeful terms about how she wants to help other heart patients prevent or at least ease some of the fears she remembers enduring.

To that end, she has formed a local chapter of Mended Hearts, a national organization with roughly 450 chapters that brings together heart patients to meet and support one another.

“Since my heart events, I thought it would be wonderful to talk with someone who’s had similar events,” Katz explains. “When I went in for my bypass, I was shaking with fear.”

After learning of Mended Hearts last year, Katz contacted the group’s regional representatives and then got in touch with Sonora Regional Medical Center nurse Joanne Rios, who manages the hospital’s cardiac rehabilitation center. Through Rios, hospital officials agreed to provide a monthly meeting place and refreshments.

Katz posted fliers about a Mended Hearts informational meeting in October to see if enough other heart patients were interested in joining. Twelve people from Tuolumne and Calaveras counties attended, leaving Katz encouraged.

Also attending was Bill Service, a Stockton resident, heart transplant recipient and Mended Hearts assistant regional representative.

“Unless you’ve had a heart event, you really don’t know what it’s like,” Service, 70, says of his own experiences and those of the many he has met through Mended Hearts. Qualified volunteers from the nonprofit also visit heart patients at hospitals before and after surgeries simply to offer support and encouragement.

Encouragement and empathy, Rios agrees, are critical.

“It’s really patients helping patients,” she says. “They need to know what to expect.”

Katz says she wishes someone would have told her and her daughter about the changes ahead,  both physically and emotionally.

After the busy and high-stress life she had, Katz says her heart attacks and surgeries have forced her to accept her limitations. Blaney adds that her mother’s personality is also different. “Things that bothered her before don’t now.”

Blaney herself has had a far different life than most teens and young adults, largely because of her mother’s critical health matters. She earned her high school diploma through independent study in order to devote as much time as possible to caring for her mother. She now works part time as an administrative assistant for the Dawn’s Light Center for Children & Adults in Grief, but still spends much of her time taking care of her mother and home matters.

“It wasn’t easy,” the amiable young woman admits of the responsibilities she has handled. “But I believe in loyalty in family. I figured the least I could do was put in a little hospital time.”

Now 59, Katz says she’s felt well enough in recent months to do some volunteer work, and while more of a homebody than ever before, she enjoys walks with her dogs and swims as often as she can in the summer months. Her efforts to launch a Mended Hearts chapter locally have also lifted her spirits.

The first official meeting of the Mended Hearts Mother Lode chapter in late January brought together 20 heart patients. As Katz had hoped, they shared their own experiences and, in doing so, gave one another some much-needed support. A few family members were also on hand. That’s important too, notes Katz, because heart disease often is inherited.

Adds Katz: “With Mended Hearts, it’s been so refreshing to talk with others who knew what I was feeling. … And we want to get out that everyone with a family history of heart problems should see a cardiologist. Particularly women.”

The new Mother Lode chapter of Mended Hearts meets from 5-6pm on the fourth Wednesday of each month at Sonora Regional Medical Center’s Live Well Be Well Center, 19747 Greenley Road. For more information, call 536-3721.

Warning signs

Some heart attacks come on suddenly and intensely, but most start slowly with mild pain or discomfort, and patients may mistakenly delay seeking treatment, according to the American Heart Association. It cites these warning signs:

Chest discomfort. Most involve discomfort, often involving discomfort in the center of the chest that lasts more than a few minutes, or that goes away and comes back. It can feel like uncomfortable pressure, squeezing, fullness or pain.

Discomfort in other areas of the upper body. Symptoms can include pain or discomfort in one or both arms, the back, neck, jaw or stomach.

Shortness of breath with or without chest discomfort.

Other signs may include breaking out in a cold sweat, nausea or lightheadedness.

As with men, women’s most common heart attack symptom is chest pain or discomfort, the heart association notes on its resource-rich website, heart.org. “But women are more likely than men to experience some of the other common symptoms, particularly shortness of breath, nausea/vomiting, and back or jaw pain.”

If a heart attack is suspected, call 911 as soon as possible.

© 2011 Friends and Neighbors

Martha Silva (left) with Krista Howell

For the fifth day in a row, Martha Silva woke with a crushing headache. She had tried to ignore the pain, but it was unrelenting. As she entered the emergency room, her chest began to hurt.

The 49-year-old Sonora woman didn’t know that headache can be one of the many symptoms of angina – chest pain caused by lack of oxygen to the heart. As unlikely as it may seem, that trip to the ER was the beginning of a success story. But things would get worse before they got better. A battery of tests revealed that Martha had suffered a heart attack, and she underwent coronary bypass surgery.

Through it all, so many thoughts went through her mind – of her family, especially – and one persistent question: “How could this happen?” She knew her mom and several uncles had heart disease, but never thought it would happen to her. It had all come out of the blue.

Looking back, Martha realizes she was in denial. She knew her family history, but didn’t see it as a warning. She had developed Type 2 diabetes, but didn’t know it was a risk factor for coronary heart disease. Instead of caring for her health, she spent her time taking care of others, a supermom dedicated to her three children, husband, grandchildren and friends.

Her busy family life and real estate career left her little time for herself. Exercise and keeping her weight down were never a concern. Martha had belonged to a fitness club for 17 years, but seldom went. She had had asthma for years, and exercise was no fun. Making sure her children made it to an endless schedule of after-school activities took priority.

Did being a supermom put her at a risk for heart disease? On the far side of surgery, Martha has come to believe it did. “I used to think the moms who went to the gym were selfish and motivated by vanity,” she said. “Now I know different.”

There’s nothing like bypass surgery for motivation, and Martha is now the star of her own inspirational story. She successfully completed Sonora Regional Medical Center’s Phase 2 cardiac rehabilitation program. And she has made dramatic changes to her daily life. She eats heart-healthy foods and does 30 minutes of aerobic exercise daily. As a result, she has lost 38 pounds, her asthma is under control, and she no longer needs diabetes medication. With her family’s support and encouragement, a healthy lifestyle is now a priority.

There is a message in Martha’s story for all caregivers who don’t take the recommended 30 minutes a day to exercise: You must still find time to care for your own health.

Martha’s story is particularly significant to me, because I know a lot of these supermoms. I sit with many of them on the bleachers at our kids’ games or practices. An easy solution: Start walking with some of the other moms during practice. Without a doubt, you will feel better.

While lying in the hospital bed after bypass surgery Martha set a goal to hike the four miles around Pinecrest Lake. She completed that trek – something that would have been impossible a few months earlier – soon after celebrating her 50^th birthday.

Martha is still very busy with her family and real estate clients. But she plans to continue making health improvement goals as a part of staying fit and healthy well into her senior years.

Exercise physiologist Krista Howell teaches senior fitness classes and supervises cardiac rehab patients for Sonora Regional Medical Center.