She didn't know what was wrong. Neither did her dad when he had a heart attack.

苏珊·科彭(Susan Koeppen)在柯克兰(Kirkland)的家中工作时，参加了两个小时的电话会议, Washington, when she started feeling pain in her left shoulder blade.

她想这是久坐不动造成的，于是她从坐着变成了站着. The pain eased a bit.

电话结束后，她上楼去拿午饭吃. That's when she was hit with an overwhelming sense of nausea.

Her husband, Rob Koeppen, was about to leave the house.

"I'm really not feeling well," Susan said. "Can you stick around?"

“当然，”罗布回答说，尽管他没有感觉到她有什么严重的问题.

Susan laid down on her bed to see if that would help. Doing so only made her shoulder pain and nausea worse.

"Could this be COVID-19?" Susan thought.

She went into the bathroom to grab an at-home COVID test. It came back negative.

当她继续感觉更糟时，她一直试图找出她不舒服的根源.

然后她想起了一件事:她父亲心脏病发作的时候, he couldn't articulate what exactly was wrong, just that he felt terrible.

She needed to get to the emergency room.

While waiting to get treated, Susan's mind flashed forward. 由于担心最坏的情况，她意识到她还没有为没有她的家庭做好准备. For instance, 现年63岁的他平时做事很有条理，但没有保存重要账户的密码日志. She began jotting them down.

When Susan finally got into a room, her blood was drawn. 大约五分钟后，一位医生过来给她开了阿司匹林和硝酸甘油.

“等一下，难道我们不应该在你给我任何东西之前弄清楚发生了什么事吗??" Susan asked.

"We know this is a heart attack," the doctor responded.

Susan and Rob were stunned.

"How could it be that my sweetheart, 谁每周慢跑或游泳一英里，或两者兼而有之几次, was having a heart attack?" Rob said.

进一步的检查显示为心脏提供大部分血液的动脉100%堵塞. She was whisked to the catheterization lab, where doctors inserted a stent to restore proper blood flow.

All of this happened within hours. The quick response likely saved her life.

Susan was able to return home the next day. She took the next couple weeks off from work to recover; during that time, she also started cardiac rehabilitation at her local hospital.

近两年后，苏珊更加关注自己的生活方式. 她每天散步，每周游泳、跑步或远足三到四次. 她还会多吃瘦肉蛋白、水果和蔬菜，同时减少甜食和红肉的摄入量.

从这个月开始，她将有更多的线上电子游戏飞禽走兽活跃起来，去旅行，享受爱人的陪伴. She's retiring from her decades-long career as a lawyer, 最近在一家大型旅游科技公司担任副总裁兼首席隐私官.

苏珊现在明白，心脏病发作的症状可能很微妙，尤其是女性. 她想起了70岁左右心脏病发作的父亲. 这件事发生的时候很令人惊讶，因为他看起来很健康. He jogged every day and even swam in the ocean.

她现在也更好地理解了她的家族史所带来的威胁. She was at an elevated risk because both her parents had heart attacks; her mom's mom had four heart attacks.

"It's a family history I can't run away from," Susan said.

关于她的家族史，好消息是她的父母不仅在心脏病发作时活了下来, but also thrived for years to come. Her mom lived to be 91, her dad 86.

"I get a lot of hope and optimism from that," Susan said. “心脏病发作并不一定意味着我的生命会更短或更不充实."

Stories From the Heart 记录心脏病和中风幸存者、护理人员和倡导者的鼓舞人心的旅程.