Tracy's story
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PrintTracy is an advocate for the American Heart Association and Go Red for Women. Listen to her story, as a young women of 40, needing to go through heart surgery.
Having family members with heart problems was nothing new to me. I never got to meet my paternal grandparents: they died while only in their 50’s. They both had heart attacks. My father was only 54 years old when he had triple bypass surgery in 1998.
When I was born, I was found to have a heart murmur. I lived a normal child hood without any real problems. In fact, my heart murmur gave me no symptoms at all and it wasn’t until the age of 25 that I was told I would probably need a valve replacement someday. They predicted this would occur when I was in my 40s. The years went by and I never developed any symptoms.
My doctor monitored my heart every 2-3 years with an echocardiogram. And then a change finally occurred. In 2007, I was 40 years old; the echo showed a weakening in my aortic valve. I needed to have open heart surgery. I needed to have a valve in my heart repaired.
I was in shock; it was so hard to believe. I never had any symptoms, I was fine. No shortness of breath, no fatigue. I had just started a new position at the hospital and felt I would be letting my co-workers down by having to be off of work. My family was very supportive and helped me get through the long five month wait before the surgery. I think that was the hardest, the waiting and wondering what was going to happen.
On August 24th, 2007, I underwent open heart surgery. The plan was to have the valve repaired, but they had to replace the whole thing with a mechanical valve. My first few weeks of recovery were hard. I had to go back to the hospital for another surgery due to a buildup of fluid around my heart. This was followed by some inflammation of the heart the following week, so I was back to the hospital for that. My murmur hadn’t really impacted my life before this. Now it was impacting me hard.
Tracy shares her story to help heighten the awareness of heart disease. To hear other storys like Tracy's and learn more about the Green Bay Go Red for Women movement, join us:
2010 Green Bay Go Red for Women Luncheon
Wednesday, May 5th
Oneida Golf and Country Club
To RSVP call Kara Muchow at 920-205-8717
