My Heart Attack Saved my Life with Susan Smith

My Heart Attack Saved my Life Susan's book
Divine Detour by Lori Ann Wood

In this heartfelt podcast episode, Susan Smith shares her transformative journey following a heart attack. She discusses how, despite her busy lifestyle and tendency to ignore warning signs, she came to realize the importance of recognizing female-specific heart attack symptoms. 

Her story emphasizes the urgency of being proactive about heart health and how her experience led to a spiritual awakening. 

By slowing down and learning to just be, she now focuses on helping other women understand the risks and signs of heart disease, advocating for awareness and preventative care through her support group and public speaking.

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Find me on my website: jan-johnson.com

Transcript

[00:01] Jan: Are you looking for an inspiring listen, something to motivate you? You've come to the right place. Welcome to Women of the Northwest, where we have conversations with ordinary women leading extraordinary lives. Motivating, inspiring, compelling. So we want to talk about your book.

[00:21] Susan Smith: All right. This is my book. It's called my heart attack saved my life. But for what? And I used this title because when I had a heart attack, I could have died, but I didn't die, and so my life was saved. And then you go, now what? Because I know from that experience that I had to change my life. And any traumatic illness or that, you know, cancer, heart attack, anything that you survive, you have to change afterwards, likely, you know, diet, exercise, all those physical things, you have to change up here. And that was the hardest part. And so I wanted to tell that story in that journey because I didn't want any woman to go through what I went through. So it's a survivor story, and it's meant to describe the symptoms of heart attack in women because they're quite different from those of a man. And a lot of us, we don't know that. We don't know what they are. So my book goes into that and how, if we don't know the symptoms, then we're likely to push right through them, because we. Can I just tell the story real quick?

[01:36] Jan: Yep.

[01:37] Susan Smith: So it's one of those type a go, go, go women.

[01:42] Jan: I don't know any of those starter.

[01:44] Susan Smith: Of things that get her done, you know, and always had a list of mile long things to do. And I didn't like to be interrupted, and I just kept going all the time. But I had a nagging ache in my collarbone, and I was a little short of breath, lightheaded. I was very tired. I thought, oh, my gosh, my pillow is too flat. That's why I'm not resting. Well, I'm short of breath because I talk too fast. I'm lightheaded because I stand up too fast. I mean, I had an excuse for everything, but those things. I just.

[02:16] Jan: You had a reason for everything I did. It was a reason for everything.

[02:20] Susan Smith: You can justify anything.

[02:22] Jan: That's right.

[02:23] Susan Smith: So I didn't know. But those things I just told you are symptoms of heart attack in women. I didn't know that because I thought of a heart attack as that of a man. And those are the ones you see in the movie. Sweat on his forehead, pain in his left arm, clutches his chest and falls to the floor. And he's either saved or he's not. And I didn't have that. So because I didn't know, therefore I ignored them. You know, when I pushed through, now I know. And now I can tell you, I can tell everyone else what those symptoms are. And once we know them, then we can pay attention to them.

[03:01] Jan: Yeah. Yeah. That's wise. Wise. When did you discover that it actually was a heart attack? What had to whomp you to get you to the hospital?

[03:14] Susan Smith: I was really in a very busy day, and I had these symptoms going on for a few days. I was tired all the time and I had the lightheadedness and I would sort of breath, and I just kept going. But on this one particular day, I had to go to the grocery store, having a spring on a class the next morning for writers. And I buy treats and I needed crackers and fruit and cheese and cookies, and I reached up for cookies and they fell on the floor. And when I went to pick them up, I knew if I went all the way over, I would faint. I was that lightheaded. So I called from my car, my primary care doctor, and I wanted to get in. And he was out of town, and I was just so brusque with her. I said, who can I see? Who's covering for him? And she said, well, you should probably call your cardiologist or go to the nearest ER. Sounds like that's what you need to do. I can't go to the emergency room. I have too much to do. I really did. And she said, we can't do anything if you're dead.

[04:20] Jan: Truer words were never said.

[04:23] Susan Smith: And she still works there and she didn't adapt. So I called my cardiologist because I had one and they hadn't seen me in ten years, but they found my file and worked me in, and I got hooked up, and he came in and he said, you're having a heart attack right now. You have to go to the ER. And I did. I mean, that was.

[04:43] Jan: That was when it finally became real, that, yeah, this is what's really happening.

[04:47] Susan Smith: Yes. And it sounds. I've told this story so many times, and I know it sounds foolish and irresponsible and all the things that it was, but I did. I didn't know. I just did not know that that was that serious.

[05:01] Jan: Yeah.

[05:01] Susan Smith: I thought he'd give me some blood pressure pills or do something and send me all my way.

[05:07] Jan: What about your husband? Did he have any idea that that's what was going on, you know, ahead of time before you ended up?

[05:14] Susan Smith: No. And because we don't I don't. Fatal, honey. I'm short of breath. You know, you just don't include them in these things. He knew something was wrong and he drove me to the doctor's office, and then he drove me to the ER, which was four blocks from the doctor's office. You shouldn't ever really drive yourself. But we did. And then I looked over. I was in the prep room and the emergency room and the cardiac team was there. Like 25 people were all around me and rapid response. And I looked at him and he was just terrified. And I felt. And he told me later, of course, he was just worried that I was going to die. And, I mean, it's just. That's one of the things I talk about in the book. We have to really think about our loved ones and care about them, because if we let ourselves fall apart and we let a chronic disease take us over, they're going to be affected. So he's. Now he's my biggest monitor.

[06:18] Jan: Is he the one that said, let me see your calendar. Let's see what we're going to cross out on it.

[06:22] Susan Smith: Absolutely, yes. And he's always saying, are you sure you're going to do that? Are you sure you really want to do that? Have you had your nap today? Did you take your pills? Don't know. For you?

[06:37] Jan: I'm fine. I'm fine. I just. I have to do. I just have to do one more thing first. I just have to do one.

[06:46] Susan Smith: This will just take a minute.

[06:47] Jan: Well, I'll take my pills after I get done with this. Just let me finish.

[06:54] Susan Smith: You know what I'm talking about.

[06:55] Jan: I think I know what you're talking about. Yeah. How long were you in the hospital then?

[07:00] Susan Smith: I was in the hospital for four days. And so that kind of slowed you down. I now know that that's longer. I mean, you can. You don't want to have a heart attack and go to the hospital. You want to be proactive and have a cardiologist if you have any of these lifestyle things. And then they may go in and do an angiogram and if they find a clogged artery, then they'll give you a stent. I mean, they gave me stents to save my life, but you can do that proactively and spend the night and then go home. You don't have to go in this emergency room way when I talk about that. And, you know, I could have avoided the whole hospital scare thing had I been proactive and caring about my heart health.

[07:49] Jan: So what happened? What happened with your heart on the spiritual side, I.

[07:55] Susan Smith: This scared me to death. I mean, scared me to death. And I've always been a woman of faith, but you have something like that happen, and you are on your knees. Well, I couldn't get on my knees. You are, you wake up, you're alive. You know, you could have died and you didn't. So, number one, you're so thankful, and you're praying to God. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Then you're going, what can I do? How can I pay you back? How can I repay you for saving my life? What do you want me to do? And then, and then pretend I'm praying to be able to breathe better, because I'm just praying for everything, and. But my heart now is really in line to be of service. That's the message I got, and that's. That's my path. That's what I'm following. And whether I've written a book or a blog or done an interview or given a talk or spoken to one woman or 50 women, that would just. I feel like I'm preaching, but people don't act like it. You know, they're always kind of glad to know I didn't know that. So it's very repetitive. I think, oh, my gosh, you've heard this before, but not really.

[09:08] Jan: Yeah.

[09:09] Susan Smith: So God put that on my heart to tell everybody, everybody. And then once you get through to them on the, on the physical side and to care for yourself so that you don't have a heart attack, then you can learn how to be collective and take good care of your heart, and you can take care of your body physically so that everything stays in shape. I mean, he wants us to be here for as long as we can. I'll tell you one other thing that I think about. I say that God made us to be human beings, human beings, not human doings. And I was so into doing as I love doing because I'm so good at it.

[09:59] Jan: I actually have that written in the side of a bulletin from, oh, many years ago. Be, not do. Yes. Like, be. It's okay to just be, you know, because your value isn't wrapped up in all the things that you do. Yeah, just beef. I love it.

[10:20] Susan Smith: So this came from my son, my grown son, two of them. And he's my mentor and my guide and my coach and everything. And after all this happened, he and I sat down in the dining room, and I got on my phone, and he got on my computer, and we went through everything, and we cancelled me from every group, every class, anything that I was doing, it was. I was out of commission. And then he said to me, he said, mom, do you think that you could just be and not be doing so much? And I said, okay. So that became my mantra. Just be. And he said, you know, you could put a hashtag in front of that.

[11:02] Jan: Because he's a younger person. Yeah, right.

[11:05] Susan Smith: And so now it's all over, you know, I see it. And you don't need a to do list. You need it to.

[11:12] Jan: To be. Yeah. Yeah. So have you actually. Have you sat down and, like, written out a bunch of to be's?

[11:22] Susan Smith: Oh, gosh. This heart attack was six years ago. I'm six years out, so I'm well into my survivorship. Although things. I mean, I've been in and out with other heart things and had an additional stand, and we just get older, and this. You have heart disease the rest of your life. So when I first started, my just b list was one to become a woman heart champion. And that is run by Mayo Clinic in Rochester. And they train women like me who have heart disease, heart conditions of any kind, that are passionate about helping spread the word. And they take you to Mayo clinic, and you're there for four days. They just pour everything into you, and you go back to your community with some additional knowledge so that you can speak and do health fairs and start support groups, that kind of thing. So I started a support group in my.

[12:17] Jan: Oh, wait, did I hear the word start?

[12:19] Susan Smith: Yeah, I did something. We agree with starter things. I did. I started a support group, and it's. Women Heart is a national organization for women who are at risk of heart disease. And we're similar to American Heart association, but we're different. We focus on peer to peer, woman to woman support, and do some fundraising. The American Heart Association is all fundraising. So anyway, we have a support group there, and we got affiliated with the local hospital, and they gave us a space to meet, and they do our notices, and they help us with do everything. And then Covid came, and then we quickly learned how to do zoom, and so we had our meetings on Zoom, and it still exists. We meet once a month.

[13:16] Jan: I think I would be stopping to evaluate who I was, you know, at my core. And what kind of things do I need to change? Do I need to be more kind? Do I need to be more loving? Do I need to be more observant of people and things or their needs? What. What parts of. Do I need to be more prayerful or.

[13:42] Susan Smith: And you do that you have hours of introspection because, once again, because you're here, you're on this planet. You live. And so what do I now need to be? And we women in this, my age and stage, grew up in an era where we are what we did.

[14:07] Jan: Right. Our identity was what we did. I know that person.

[14:10] Susan Smith: Yeah. And it's very common, and it's. And I think that's improving somewhat. But when you're conditioned to be what you do, I think that's where all this busyness comes from. So, yes, I needed to be. I mean, I was already kind, but I wanted to be more kind because I wanted to take more time. More time. More time. More time. And be more mindful of each thing I did and each person that I interacted and. And I needed to be more mindful of my own health, my own body. I wasn't taking care of it right. Because I wasn't paying attention to it.

[14:50] Jan: Right. And I think a lot of us, you know, we just go day by day and we don't, you know, slow enough down to really think about.

[14:58] Susan Smith: Yes, we have other people to make sure that they're okay.

[15:02] Jan: Are you familiar with Lori Ann Wood? Yeah. An author that had heart.

[15:09] Susan Smith: She’s my heart sister. We were severe heart together.

[15:12] Jan: Yeah. That's what I was wondering. Yeah.

[15:14] Susan Smith: And her book, Divine Detour came the same year as mine.

[15:17] Jan: Same. So good. Yeah. I just listened to the audiobook of that and. Yeah. And I read her blogs and, of course.

[15:25] Susan Smith: And I. I did a guest vlog, I don't know, last year, I guess.

[15:29] Jan: Live here. Yeah.

[15:30] Susan Smith: Yes. A lot of it. Not a lot of us, but like. Like Lori and like myself, you survive and you want. You want to help. You want to help people. And her experience and her. She's a powerful writer. Yes.

[15:45] Jan: Yeah.

[15:45] Susan Smith: Yeah. She's my hard sister from now. Small world.

[15:50] Jan: Of course she is. Yeah. I'll put links to her books in the show notes as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What would you like to leave our listeners with?

[16:04] Susan Smith: I think I want to say to women out there, young women in particular, that I see running around having busy lives. They have children, they have husbands, they have jobs, they have nonprofits that they take care of, and they are happily being so busy. And I watch them, and I. They'll say, well, I'm young. I don't have heart disease. I feel just fine in my family, but I feel just fine. Or my dad or my mom had whatever, and I said, just, I can't make them change. But these young women and I admire them so much. They're smart and savvy and they know what they're doing. But I said, just make sure every day that you take time for yourself. Give yourself some luxury. Something where you take time out for yourself and step away from all the doing so that you can just be as the young woman. I know that. Listen, we'll run into one another, and they go, yeah, I'm doing it.

[17:07] Jan: Wise counsel. Yeah. Yeah.

[17:10] Susan Smith: It's fun to be so old that you're the counselor.

[17:15] Jan: That's the fun part of being old.

[17:16] Susan Smith: The fun part.

[17:18] Jan: Other things have gone before and you get a little wiser as you go along, right?

[17:22] Susan Smith: A little.

[17:23] Jan: A little. Well, thank you, Susan. This has been great. I will share your book and your website, all your stuff, whatever.

[17:32] Susan Smith: Thank you. Janice is a wonderful opportunity. So appreciate it. I'm so happy to get to know you better and all the things that we have in.

[17:40] Jan: Okay.

[17:40] Susan Smith: Okay. Thank you.