The Color of February is Red
February is National Heart Month. Wearing red shows you recognize it, support it and hopefully do something for your health so you don’t succumb to heart disease. For so many years research has spotlighted men and heart disease. Yet heart disease is the number one killer of women.
Unfortunately, many women may suffer a heart attack but not recognize it as such. Often they don’t have the classic symptoms of chest pain that most men experience. They may experience:
- Upper body pain or discomfort in one or both arms, the back, neck, jaw or stomach
- Shortness of breath
- Weakness
- Unusual fatigue
- Cold sweats
- Dizziness
To paraphrase Shakespeare, if you have any of these symptoms that last more than a few minutes, “get thee to a hospital” fast. Better to be wrong, finding out it was something else, than dead or disabled the rest of your life.
Of course, there’s no reason you have to wait until you get symptoms and have to be reactive. How about being proactive? See your doctor and have your blood pressure and cholesterol checked. Eat a heart-heatlhy diet (check out www.heart.org – American Heart Association for ideas or visit www.spinarecipe.com for healthy recipes) and for goodness sakes, get some aerobic exercise. Choose the activity you enjoy the most and do it for at least 30 minutes per day.
Okay, so you don’t enjoy exercising. Do you have anything against a vigorous walk in the park? That will do just as well as any organized exercise regime. As Nike would say “Just do it!”.