Story about saving the heart

Dominic was walking slowly towards his car. He wasn’t in a hurry as the workday had just ended. The parking lot was almost empty, allowing him to get around quietly and think about life at the same time. Like about how nicely he spent his 50th birthday in your favorite restaurant, how well his procurement business is going, and how much fun he’ll be having this weekend at the cottage for “barbecue-brandy”. 

Uh oh, his breathing’s getting kind of funky after about 10 minutes of walking. There was a stabbing sensation in the heart, then another – harder. Dominic picked up the pace, “I gotta get to the car, there’s a bottle of nitroglycerine in the glove compartment.”

All is well. There’s a pill under his tongue, and drops of cold sticky sweat on his forehead. Dominic looked in the rear view mirror, seeing his puffy grayish face and second chin. “Mhmm,” he mumbled under his breath. He also had a “beer belly”, high blood pressure, hemorrhoids, and bad genetics. That’ll never put you in a good mood.

It turns out that after half a century, the human body activates a self-destruction mechanism. “No, I’m still a fighter!” Dominic cried, angry with himself. “Nicholas planned a hike earlier in the mountains, told me to get myself prepared, to train my running. I’m gonna start tomorrow”.

The beginning was hard: every morning, fighting with sleep, laziness and breathlessness for 20 minutes, Dominic went for a run. A month passed like this and the long-awaited hike took place and that was that. Daily sports were replaced by sweet slumber in the mornings and indulging in the tasty and unhealthy in the evenings in front of the computer.

And a year later, pain in the heart increased. His pressure started to jump like crazy. Later there were cardiograms, an ultrasound, doctor’s appointments, and even an appointment with a professor.

The whole chain broke down after Dominic went for an appointment with an elderly doctor, a follower of the traditional school of medicine. The doctor looked through his medical history, listened, tapped around, heard a few breaths and then calmly but strictly said, “Change the way you live. Forever. Reduce your salt intake, less animal fats, and lose some weight. Plus, include regular exercise, or you’ll suffer a heart attack in the next couple of years.” He also gave a list of healthy and harmful cholesterol reduction products.

It turned out to be quite a motivating appointment. Well, of course, Dominic’s new life didn’t start the next morning, and not even a month later. Changes went on for several years, slowly, gradually. The little guy on his left shoulder was whispering to him all the time, saying “Don’t change anything! Everyone lives like this and that’s okay, everything will be okay.” But the other little guy on the right, over the years, sounded more and more convincing: “Stop blaming everything on bad genes! Genetics is the gun, but your lifestyle is the trigger. Don’t let the bullet come out! Right now, all your efforts should be made on restoring your health. Everything else comes later.”

Surprisingly, the beginning of the journey didn’t include jogging and dieting, but books. Books about health and physical education, eating habits and water, and about heart attack and stroke. Every day the doctor’s words became clearer and clearer along with the fact that something had to be changed forever.

“I’ll start again, I’ll try to start running again,” decided Dominic. It didn’t work this time either. After a few training sessions, his foot fell ill. That’s when he began simply walking. He bought a pedometer and set a goal for himself: 10 thousand steps per day. Again, he suffered the occasional stutters – it was really hard to walk so much out of habit. However, at the time, daily walks at a fast pace already brought Dominic good results and a decent workload.

On the nutritional side, things were more difficult. His inner voice was fuming, “What about milk and a gingerbread cookie?! How can you go without your dried fish and beer? Without some shish kebab and cognac?!” You try and break your favorite (and delicious) habits this way! Dominic’s wife came to the rescue. She had actually begun to change her eating habits a long time ago, getting carried away with yoga. Now, her advice and experience became a great support for him. Conversations on everyday topics were replaced by lively discussions about healthy food and sports for those over 50 years old. His wife wisely ignored the fact that Dominic started to put business and home affairs in second place, sincerely rejoicing at his every victory on his path to good health, all the while teaching and encouraging him.

Fasting, vegetarianism, raw food – everything became possible for him. Diagnoses fell apart one after another, bicycle tours and ski marathons appeared instead. Dominic laughed, “It turns out that over the years, the body is apparently also capable of getting younger”. In the mirror, an interesting, toned man with a six pack of abs was looking at him and not the retiree from the past with a sagging belly and a second chin for whom the most important thing in his building was the elevator.

“Well, good,” thought Dominic, “if I have succeeded, it’s time to tell everyone that health is interesting and achievable. I just have to share my knowledge and experience with my loved ones, and we will be healthy and young together”.

Nope! A swing and a miss. Dominic’s relatives met his proposal with perplexing glances, and his friends thought him crazy, offering him to come back to a “normal life”.

“This can’t go on,” he thought, “there are certainly those who need my experience, who will find it interesting, and perhaps even be inspired to make some serious changes.

Whatever the case, Dominic soon plunged into the World Wide Web. At first, it was scary: what would his friends have said if they had seen his timid attempts at conquering the Internet and how will others appreciate his techniques and knowledge?

On the first paid training session there were 40 people on the other side of the screen. To overcome impostor syndrome, a simple decision was made: “If you don’t like the lesson, you get your money back.” 

Of course, there were both negative criticism and sarcastic comments. Everyone goes through this…

Today, Dominic runs a blog where he talks about his health and habits, uploads videos about sports and tourism on his YouTube channel, and publishes photos from his training sessions on Instagram.

Each of us, no matter what age, can get into such a situation where a choice must be made. Ten years ago Dominic had to choose between life and a possible heart attack (death, in short). There was only one decision to make: move! Move in every possible meaning – on roads and through mountains, through obstacles and passes; to move only forward, towards a new self.