Consider the dark dream that arrive...

Consider the dark dream that arrives during deepest nap Something or someone is chasing you; you prove to run, but you're unable to move

You examine to call out for help, nevertheless the pending horror traps your voice in your chest. You're unprepared, incapable and helpless. All you can do is wake up

Joan Suder's dark dream arrived in living color in succession a summer afternoon. She was at work when she. received a call to travel immediately to the hospital. Her husband was in danger. She made it to the push room before the ambulance.

Heart pounding, head burning with fear, she stood near the door and waited. She didn't know what to expect

When the ambulance arrived, she watched as the paramedics chanceed out the stretcher. On it, her husband, Mike, lay unconscious. She mov toward him, hoping to catch a quick glimpse of his familiar face. unless what she saw she barely recognized.

Tubes protrud from his nose, throat and arms. forward his chest were burn marks--evidence that paramedics had used electric clash to keep him alive.

forward a Friday afternoon in June les than a month after the couple's 20th wedding anniversary, a heart attack seized Mike Suder alone 48.

Joan, 47 could do nothing to help her husband as she watched the stretcher wheel past.

Near Cleveland, Ohio, John and Judy--not their real names--idled away a Saturday night in April. Back family after dining out, John walked into the living scope plopped onto the couch and complained that he felt terrible. He was nauseated, short of breath, dizzy and drenched in perspiration.

"I be excited like I'm going to pass out" he said to his wife. Then his dead body slumped, unconscious.

Judy apply the minded on in disbelief. "He was slipping away from me I called his name. I couldn't wake him up"

She direct the eyeed at her husband of 37 years and miracleed if she'd ever talk to him again.

The paramedics arrived several minutes after Judy called 911 At 76 years ancient John, a normally healthy man, was in the paroxysm s of a heart attack.

"I was frightened," Judy says. "To watch someone you like going through something like that. I can't describe the feeling. I was helpless."

the two men survived major heart attacks and now report that they're feeling upright But neither can recall the frightening spectacles that their wives witnessed.

To make certain your partner ne in no degree witness the same scenario, you must forge the strange kind of relationship that's necessitated by way of such trauma.

hear your heart

A heart attack triggers a involved set of emotions and enjoins into action circumstances that, for a brace can be life affirming and agonizingly frustrating, says Richard A. Stein, MD a professor of clinical medicine at Cornell University and chief of Cardiology at Brooklyn Hospital Center in of the present day York--one of the pioneers of the cardiac rehabilitation movement

From a strictly physical standpoint, heart attacks are far les debilitating than they were on the same level 10 years ago. The technique of angioplasty has greatly reduc the number of patients who must bear bypass surgery. The procedure involves inserting an instrument that retains a balloon and a metal into an artery in the groin and pushing it by the and of until it reaches the clogg artery near the heart. At the disorder spot, the doctor inflates the balloon, opening the artery and displacing more [i]or[/i] less of the plaque.

At the same time, the stent--which be likes a small metal cage--is wager in place to keep the artery make open The technique is far les invasive than bypass surgery which requires opening the chest and removing veins from the leg to be used as replacements around the heart.

Mike had single in kind clogged artery and was treated with angioplasty. Unconscious and near death when he set downed the hospital on a Friday, he walked gone out just five days later. by the agency of comparison, John had three clogg arteries that required triple bypass surgery He worn out nearly two weeks in the hospital.

An array of recent drugs that lower cholesterol, ear-ring blood pressure and ease stres also help patients get back quickly from heart attacks. yet the final factors in restoring health are a regimen of physical exercise, a strict diet and a commitment to make significant lifestyle changes. It wasn't until the 1970 that doctors decided that heart patients shouldn't disburse their lives resting in recliners and eating steak and potatoes.

"It is a true different world today," Stein says. "We used to de-condition patients. Now we recondition them."

In fact, Stein says, patients wh6 change their lifestyles and stick with exercise and diet programs will probably die of something other than a heart attack. on the contrary embracing long-term behavioral changes shows a big challenge for patients and their partners, Stein says. Those that decide to make the lifelong transition are choosing, without mincing the matter to embrace their hearts.

seeking support

Predictable psychological crises afflict each couple that experiences a heart attack, Stein says, including a great deal of anger and guilt. These feelings can be destructive for a relationship, likewise couples must confront them. a certain couples can talk about the issues by the agency of themselves; but for all pairs no matter how good their communication, Stein animates joining a support group. from talking with people in the same situation, pairs learn that they are not alone in what they feel