Heart disease hits home

Someone dies of heart disease every 90 seconds, according to the American Heart Association, but it took less than 60 seconds for heart disease to change my life forever.

Around 11 pm on Oct. 9, 2014, my dad fell to the floor, unable to breathe.

Less than a minute later, my dad was dead of a heart attack.

After accepting the loss of my dad, I realized I needed to do something about the enormous threat that heart disease poses for me. So I have taken steps to understand the risks for heart disease and lower my personal risk.

The heart’s job is to pump blood to the entire body, but it also relies on blood to do that job. Conditions such as diabetes, high blood pressure and high LDL cholesterol restrict the flow of blood to the heart. This means that people with these conditions are more likely to have a heart attack than people without them, according to The American Heart Association, a donor- funded, nonprofit headquartered in Dallas.

The American Heart Association, founded in 1924, seeks to reduce disability and deaths caused by cardiovascular disease and stroke by increasing awareness about appropriate cardiac care. I seek to do the same thing in this blog.

In addition to increasing awareness, I want to share my personal journey to leading a more heart-healthy lifestyle.

Heredity is an important risk factor for heart disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services, headquartered in Atlanta.

When I began assessing my risk for heart disease, I first looked at my family history. My dad and great granddad died of heart disease. Currently, my grandma and great uncle are fighting it. The other risk factors I mentioned above, high blood pressure, diabetes and high LDL cholesterol, also run in my family.

So the odds are stacked against me. But eating a better diet and regularly exercising are two things I can practice to lower my risk for heart disease. Before I could start, I needed to find out what a healthy diet and weight are for my height and age.

The easiest way to determine where you are in relation to a healthy weight is by calculating your body mass index. BMI is a measure of body fat based on height and weight and it applies to adult men and women. To help calculate my BMI, I found a BMIcalculator from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, a division of the National Institutes of Health, located in Bethesda, MD. This page also has a scale that outlines the BMI categories.

To find out what a healthy diet is I found the Healthy Weight Pyramid from Mayo Clinic, a nonprofit medical practice and medical research group based in Rochester, MN. After inputting my information I was given a daily calorie goal and a breakdown of the calories and servings of each food group that I should have.

I also needed to see what exercises I should do in order to strengthen my heart and lose weight. Aerobic exercise, or any form of activity that increases your respiratory and heart rate, is the best form of exercise to strengthen your heart, according to the CDC.

Since I lost my dad I have been intentional about eating healthfully and exercising more. I go to the gym three times a week to strengthen my heart and maintain a healthy weight. I have stopped drinking soda and started drinking water to maintain a healthy blood pressure. I am also practicing portion control and reading the labels of the food I eat in order to maintain a healthy weight, which lessens the work my heart has to do.

I have also tried to honor my dad by creating this blog. I hope to help others realize the danger of heart disease, understand their risk for it and take action to prevent it.

Lack of information is one reason heart disease is the No. 1 cause of death globally, according to The World Health Organization, a specialized agency of the United Nations formed in 1948 and headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.

In order to fight heart disease you have to know what it is, what the symptoms are and what you can do to prevent it.

I hope to provide you with all of this information and more in “Take Heart.”

- Read more at https://helpingyourheart.wordpress.com/2015/02/24/heart-disease-hits-home/