Heart Attack to 10K (part 4.12) - Plus & minus 3.5 years; heart attack to half marathon!
(Phase VI - sustaining a healthy life-style)
"Nothings going to happen unless you make it happen."
Going back about 3 weeks to Tuesday 8th Sept. 2020 this was not just another 'working from home' day for me but a far more significant landmark which came about because of a heart attack I had on the 28th Dec 2016, 3.5 years ago (or 3 years, 8 months and 11 days ago to be precise). As I lay in the Harefield hospital bed days after Christmas the realisation that I had gone from having my first angiogram and stents (when I was diagnosed with unstable angina) to a heart attack in a little the over previous 3.5 years (or 3 years, 8 mon....., you get the picture) scared and even frightened me …. where the hell would I be in the next 3.5 years (now) if I carried on the same way?
It was then that I decided I had to take serious action to prevent things getting worse and set a goal to improve my health & fitness to reduce the risk over the next 3.5 years by as much as it had deteriorated in the last 3.5 years – to reverse the trend.
Despite through the lock-down losing some of the confidence, stamina and pace I had built up over the past 3 years, spurred on by the incredible endeavours of Stuart Wheeler and Warren Bennet together with many members of the YPOM (Your Pace or Mine) running group to run a marathon on each weekend of September, I decided to still go ahead with the Maidenhead half marathon challenge on 27th Sept. to prove to myself I had achieved that 3.5 year goal but also because Hearts & Souls, the charity who supports the excellent cardiac rehab programme in South Bucks that helped to regain my confidence and set me on this path in the first place has had cancel all its own fund raising activities this year leaving a massive shortfall which I hope to help offset.
Having found it so difficult to run alone throughout the lock-down period, there was no way I would attempt this challenge without support so I put out
an appeal on the YPOM facebook page for a couple of long distance
runners to accompany me and was so pleased that in response I
had runners who have shared in a significant part of my journey since
I took up running. First up was Andy King who helped me achieve my
first non-stop parkrun by improving my pacing technique, next was Kris
Chaplin whose support has been absolutely phenomenal over the years
climaxing in that unique pulsing medal, Nikki Noo Naa and Jenny Hedges both
who have joined me on several runs over the years and whose
encouragement and sense of fun is so infectious you have to enjoy any torture you put yourself through and then my old
Chairboy pal and fellow veteran runner who I first met in 2008 when he managed one
of my youth teams at Totteridge FC, attended that first FFIT course
alongside me and started parkrun about the same time, it is really
fitting that Paul Szefer should join this run having shared so much of this
adventure together and recently sadly losing his wife, like myself I know Paul has gained
great strength from the support within the running community at a time when it was really needed. Altogether there were 6 of us, the maximum allowable by Boris and the largest group I have been in, in any situation, since the last parkrun before the lock-down back in mid March.
I set up a JustGiving page but because through the Covid lots
charities have been hit hard, there are many others who are raising funds for good causes
that competition for donations is proving more difficult than in
previous years. I found this a little disappointing as, as far as I
can tell, mine was the ONLY charitable fund raiser for Hearts & Souls this
year, the charity having to cancel all its normal activities relying entirely on the generosity of personal donations, while the
most of other charities were large national organisations which many
people support across the country. Don't get me wrong, I understand every good cause is finding it hard and is a worthy claim so I am extremely
grateful for those that have and will support this cause with Instron
again showing their loyalty to it's employees and charities supporting the local community by not just making a
generous donation to Hearts & Souls and also supporting WWSET
(Wycombe Wanderers Sports & Education Trust) who run the highly
successful FFIT lifestyle course I attended straight after rehab. [see part 4.1].
JustGiving page ... https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/peter-jemmett
THE MAIDENHEAD HALF ATTACK:
On to the run, parking up Kris and Paul were already chatting in the car park and Andy turned up a few minutes later. We all descended to Costa in the High Street where we had arranged to meet the girls. That was my first mistake of the day, Andy bought me a bucket of coffee which just had the effect of making me seek a tree to pee behind throughout the run.
It was a pleasant morning, a touch on the cold side but I decided not to overdress as I know I quickly warm up though went with a pair of gloves as I tend to get freezing hands courtesy of the beta-blockers.
The one thing I really needed on this run was a good pacer as though I start with good intentions of running a slow I always have a tendency to speed up as I'm running, the team did a marvellous job at keeping the pace nice and steady staying below my angina threshold especially in the cold, and with the occasional stop this was without doubt the best and most constant and longest I have run post heart attack as clearly shown on these two pace graphs on the same course, the first the week before where I ran one lap with Jo and the second the two lap half marathon.
Normally, I will get leg muscle pains particularly on any incline but also on level ground after a prolonged run and constantly need to slow to a walk so ease the pain, also the hip injury I sustained during the FFIT 5-a-side 1.5 years ago still aches after a distance. I suspect that I may have slight PADS (peripheral artery disease) and mentioned to my GP some time ago, he dismissed it as old age though having CHD it is a possibility. Treatment is much the same as CHD mainly through meds and lifestyle changes so I have never pursued it further as these are changes I have already made. Before leaving home I took some Codeine and as a result didn't experience any leg or hip pain until near the very end of the run and as a result managed to keep going at this slower pace for much longer stretches and felt really good only resorting to my GTN (magic) spray once near the end.
The run was broken with a few short stops to recharge on (black) jelly babies or to find a tree with an extended break in Cookham on both laps where my daughter Kaitlyn and her boyfriend George were on hand with chocolate Swiss mini rolls and took some team photos.
It was only on the last 1 or 2km that the strain started to tell, probably as the Codeine wore off but determined as ever we ran as a group down the full length of the High Street past bemused shoppers, eventually reaching the 21.1km mark just outside 'The Bear' in 3:17 elapsed time or quite impressively 2:45 moving time, though this was never about time and it was a damn sight slower than my previous half marathon's back in the 80's where I never exceeded 2 hours, but who cares!
Half marathon in pictures .... here
During a round of coffee's as we were basking in the glory of our successful run, I started to come over dizzy and feeling numb with tingling in my hands and fingers, a quick ECG on my portable Kardia monitor [see part 4.11] showed I had a elevated pulse but otherwise normal, with thankfully no trace of AF. It took a couple of 'decaff' coffees before I started to feel right again but my pulse remained higher than normal for most of the day. In retrospect I should have slowed my pulse gradually by walking a 'cool down' once completing the course but I was just so overwhelmed by what has just been achieved that I didn't give it a second thought.
I could never have reached this stage without the tremendous support and encouragement from so many people throughout my recovery, from cardiac rehab, FFIT, parkrun, YPOM, the doctors, nurses and specialists at practically every hospital within a 35 mile radius of High Wycombe, not just for cardiac treatment but many other medical problems I suffered along the way.
To get through this half marathon I have to thank Codeine, Rivaroxban and Isosorbide but far more seriously to Andy, Kris, Jenny, Nicky and not forgetting Paul who has been beside me for the whole journey - this run just could not have happened without your tremendous support and encouragement. Likewise this was Paul's first half marathon for nearly as long as myself, so I would like to dedicate this run and achievement to the memory of Jeanette Szefer, the late wife of Paul, who sadly passed away in April 2020.
To round off a successful Sept. I was featured in the Wycombe Rye 'parkrun' profile which is also worth a read .... here
The flip side to this is the satisfaction of achieving fantastic cardiac test results, the reduction in medication, and then reaching the highs of such unexpected results through running, raising another £1,143.00 on this event to bring the overall total to £4,604.00 for Hearts & Souls and of course the amazing help and many friendships made along the way.
It has been a delight having strangers telling me how the
blog has inspired them, particularly from recent heart patients, how it has
helped them through those early uncertain stages following a cardiac event and
given them hope for their own future and I’m immensely proud of what my readers
have shared with me recorded through my testimonials. I’ve been more than happy to share my
adventures if it is of any help or gets others to consider their own health and
fitness needs before leaving it too late and that is about as much as I could hope
for.
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| 3.5 years of bling! |
Thank-you for reading and I would love to hear your thoughts on any subject I have covered, please leave your comments below or email me at peterjemmett@aol.com
My full story - from heart attack to half marathon:
Part 1 - That fateful day. (Phase I - heart attack) click here
Part 2 - Back home & drama at White Hart Lane. (Phase II - home recovery) click here
Part 3 - They tried to make me go to rehab, I said yes, yes, yes please. (Phase III - cardiac rehabilitation) click here
Part 4.1 - Getting FFITer and Harefield & Heartbreak hill revisited (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.2 - Walking for heart & soul & finding parkrun (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.3 - End of year 1 round-up and assessment (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.4 - Falling heart rate: fitter or hibernation? (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.5 - Pain in the bum, going senile and sub 30! (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.6 - Sub 29, attack of the AKI and 1 year old (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.7 - Pushing the boundaries (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.9 - 3 Years On, Ragged Radnage and Pete's bolus journey (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.10 - Coping with COVID-19 and what they say (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.11 - Living in the lock-down (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Next:
Part 4.15 - Getting back in the groove (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.18 - The 5 year itch, time to cut the CRAP! (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.19 - The last word (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.20 - Persisting with parkrun (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.21 - Stuck in reverse (recap of 2022) (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Part 4.25 - Life changes (Phase IV - sustaining a healthy life-style) click here
Well done Peter - It was a pleasure running with you yesterday, as always. Great log of the day, and the history behind why this was so historically important for you.
ReplyDeleteThe pleasure was all mine. Since the start of this pandemic it has been so rare for me to get out with others and to do that run with that particular group made it all the better. I can't thank all you guys enough.
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