In February, Gary suddenly fell poorly late one evening after watching a film.

He had a sudden feeling of heart burn/ indigestion that rapidly changed into severe chest and upper back pain. He arrived in hospital, had an ECG and bloods taken, a cardic consultant spoke with us and advised Gary was having a serious heart attack and that his heart muscle was starting to die and he needed an urgent emergency operation to save his life.

The heart specialists managed to quickly source the problem and were able to rectify it during the operation, although it was touch and go for a while.

Gary was in for almost a week, his life literally changed overnight and he has been faced with a varierty of emotions, physical discomfort, numerous challenges and still has alot of uncertainity, along with taking a significant amount of medications for the rest of his life now.

He still has another operation and more investigations to be had before he can fully try and recover and eventually move forward.

Gary has been off work since and will continue to be off for the foreseeable. Gary is on a waiting list for a Cardiac MRI scan to investigate a hole in the heart that may have been caused by the heart attack. There is not a date in sight yet unless you go private with quite a heavy price tag. Min £3500

The mental, physical and finacial challenges that this has created is immense to Gary, his wife and children. As discussed with the cardiac doctors Gary is quite young (only 38) it was not expected and there is not a handbook on how to recover with a young family, mortgage and the current cost of living.

The family would like to make others aware of symtoms that occured and ask for a donation however small just to help with the day to day running of their life, potential medical scans, bills and to help aid in a stress free recovery while they try and figure out a new normal.

The doctors believe it was quite likely stress related and we have since learnt that stress is the number one killer in the UK.

Symtoms: severe belching, restless, heartburn/ indigestion sensation, burning pain in the chest ….slightly achey arm (more of a discomfort as if he had over done it at work) It rapidly turned to a severe curshing pain in the chest and upper back. He became clammy and sweaty but cold to touch on his abdomen and back, then turned a greyish colour. His mouth became extremely dry- no saliva

Thank you so much for taking the time to read about Garys sad and challenging health journey and the impact it has and is having on him and the family.

The family and Gary would like to thank all of the staff at The William Harvey Hospital who reacted quickly and managed the triage, the operation effectively, efficiently and ultimately saved his life.

Thank you to the Community Cardiac Rehabiltation Team who have all been a massive suppprt to both Gary andd myself over the last few weeks.

If I can offer any advice, it would be…

If you need HELP, JUST ASK x