KENNEBUNK, Maine — There are support groups for patients dealing with a cancer diagnosis, for anyone recovering from drug or alcohol abuse, and even support groups for grief.
Lisa Eaton truly believes that meeting once a week with other survivors of heart attacks has made a difference in her recovery both emotionally and physically.
Eaton had what's called a SCAD heart attack in 2021, which means spontaneous coronary artery dissection. As Eaton describes it, the inner layer of her artery tore, causing blood to pool, forming a blockage. Through that first heart attack, doctors discovered an underlying heart condition, which forced her to make some changes in her life.
Eaton runs a business making specialty bow ties, and has been running most of her life. She's always been active, so when she had her first heart attack, she didn't immediately recognize the symptoms. She felt sinus pressure and thought it was allergies; shoulder pain she contributed to moving furniture to paint; and heaviness in her chest she thought might be a panic attack.
Eaton had just lost a good friend to suicide, so the panic attack made sense. She was dealing with a lot of feelings. But she did have one more strange feeling.
"The muscle that forms that circle around your smile felt like it was made of leather, like I had to stop and massage it. It was very bizarre but I was like, 'That doesn’t feel good. That doesn’t feel right,'" Eaton said.
One year later Lisa knew it was all happening again when the pain of loss resurfaced while watching a play about suicide. She felt emotional all over again, and within the next few days, felt many of those same symptoms she felt in her first heart attack.
Now a survivor of two heart attacks, Eaton's runs have adjusted to brisk walks on the treadmill in her basement office, especially in the winter when the cold can actually restrict her arteries. That's something she learned in cardiac rehab at Turning Point in Scarborough, which is also where she made new friends.
"I have to say the most important thing for me in terms of dealing with having had a heart attack, was meeting another woman who had basically the exact same heart attack," Eaton said.
That woman, Sue Howard, is her self-proclaimed SCAD sister.
"I felt like I was alone after I had my heart attack," Howard said. "Then the doctors recommended cardiac rehab, which was great for me mentally and physically, and meeting with the people that had also been through the same experience. I walk in and I’m like, 'These are my people.'"
Her people formed a support group that now meets once a week over lunch. Sometimes the conversation is about their health, sometimes it’s about the weather, but it's always therapeutic.
Eaton recalled one of the first times she realized how meaningful their conversations were when a gentleman in the group spoke about the effect his heart attack has had on his family.
"The food came and while we were quietly eating he said, 'My wife is really worried that I’m gonna die,'" Eaton took a moment to collect herself while sharing the story. "It was just so touching and so vulnerable and so … aren’t we all in the same boat here?"
Through shared trauma, these people from all different walks of life and varying forms of heart conditions learn more about themselves.
I asked Eaton if the support group was just as much a piece of her recovery as the doctors and the rehab, to which she responded, "Yes. Absolutely, yes."