Heart Story — How a checkup saved my life ❤️

Do you listen to stories of sudden death from cardiac arrests in young generation these days? And then think I am keeping my lifestyle healthy so I am immune from this. I used to think exactly the same until one day I was told by my Doctor, that I am in the same boat carrying a ticking time bomb in my chest!

What!! Yes. I was shocked to core.

On a Wednesday morning in April 2024, I walked into India’s one of the biggest hospital for a regular health checkup. After my pulmonary examination, X-ray and ECG i went for a TMT — Tread Mill Test.

I was dreading it. I have never been an exerciser or runner. The best i run is running away from responsibilities 😉.

I waited for my turn and after half an hour when I went inside and met a senior doctor who looked cheerful. Someone surely had a great morning coffee. He asked me to sit for a quick checkup. That day I realized Doctors have 2 Super Powers —

1. Smile — If the doctor greets you with smile, half your worries / anxiety just fly away. You feel confident that underneath the white coat is a person with human touch.
2. Stethoscope — Honest confession : I never gave the due importance to this life saving man made marvel

The doctor put his stethoscope on my chest and his smile faded. He asked his attendant not to do a TMT for me. I smiled now. He further mentioned do an Echo instead. My smile faded now. I could sense something is off.

The Echo test was done, and the the doctor’s fear graphically emerged on the Echo machine with a red blue patch. My heart had an anomaly😥.

The junior doctors gathered around the machine as the senior doctor showed them and started talking in medical jargons — calcification in AV, severe AS, AVR required.

I wanted to interrupt them and tell them it’s bad manners to speak a language that not everyone in the room understands 💁‍♂️. If I started speaking Hebrew, would you like it?

Fortunately, good sense prevailed on me and I didn’t say anything stupid (being introvert is my superpower💪).

After there intellectual discussion the senior doctor came up to me and told me what the problem was — “Calcification in the bicuspid Aortic Valve has led to severe Aortic Stenosis. Thus an Aortic Valve Replacement will be required”.

I know how you are feeling right now reading this, so I will translate it in normal English.

Our heart pumps blood into the major artery — Aorta. Between the heart and Aorta is a small valve which opens and closes with every beat so that the blood is pumped into the artery and doesn’t come back into heart.

This valve is called as Tricuspid valve because (yes, you guessed it right) it has 3 cusps. Unfortunately some people (1–2%) are born with 2 cusps instead of 3. As a result, this anomalous valve is called (no prizes for guessing) — Bicuspid Valve. And I was one of those people — the chosen one (percent).

Over a period of time, calcium gets deposited in this bicuspid valve and it degenerates in such a fashion that it starts having two problems :

1. Area of the valve reduces — in my case it has reduced by 75% so the blood flow has reduced
2. The valve doesn’t close completely so blood starts flowing back leading to heart problems

This condition is called Aortic Stenosis, and in my case it was SEVERE and needed urgent attention.

If undetected and untreated , I could have been on the list of young people (I am 35 years old / young) getting a stroke or worse still — heart failure in a gym, or a dance performance or even a stage show (I am a comedian).

Anything that is stressful for my heart was super dangerous.

The only solution for this problem is that the existing malfunctioning valve needs to be changed through a heart surgery and a mechanical valve will be installed instead — Aortic Valve Replacement (AVR).

In some sense with a mechanical powerhouse in my chest, I will become Iron Man 😎.

I was shocked and could not process this information. The doctor sensed it and tried to placate me saying I am not the only one in the world to get it done. But it was difficult to shake me out of my zone. I took some time for me to sink the news in, that at just 35 years of age I will be going through an open heart surgery.

As the news was sinking, so was my heart.

I couldn’t resist my tears and I sobbed. A part of me was telling me how embarrassing it is, to cry out in public. But I couldn’t keep it in. Last time I cried in public was when my then girlfriend broke my heart, and this time again it was a heart issue. The correlation of tears and heart is very strong! 🥹

By the time I could gain my sense back, the doctor also showed me the silver lining that the proactive health checkup helped in finding out the problem before it became a medical catastrophe.

I think this is the point of view that really got me back to normalcy. I picked up my bag and went back home.

After putting much thought to it, I realised that I can’t let this one (major) incident define my complete life. I might be the first person in my social circle to get this kind of sudden revelation, but not the first one on the planet.

Life has given me lemons, I need to squeeze the maximum out of it.

Improv Comedy has played a major role in my life, and this is the Perfect moment for me to “Yes, And”. It’s a philosophy i have always lived by and here is probably the biggest test of implementing this philosophy to practical use.

There was a curveball and it was my turn to swing the bat

This was a gentle reminder for vulnerability and preciousness of life. Time for Gratitude and Counting my blessings that I got to know about it in advance when i could prepare my mind, and have a support system of my family and friends around me.

I will be going for the surgery in the next 7 days. I am optimistic that everything will go well and I will emerge physically fitter and mentally stronger than ever before.

I strongly urge you to get your health checkups done regularly. We have no idea what’s going on inside us. Better we find it out ourselves, instead of the body raising alarms and take us off guard.

If you found this article useful, do share it twith your friends and family to give them a nudge into going for their regular health checkups. Your share can save a life 😇