Greeting from the UK

[Daryl]

Hi everyone,

My name is Daryl, I am 46, and I’m from the UK. I’m very happy to have found this group, and hope hearing from other people will help to inform me and calm my anxiety down, which at the moment is through the frickin roof.

I had a TIA stroke 3 weeks ago. On investigation my echocardiogram came back with a Dilated ascending aortic root and aorta of 4.6cm. On reading up on this condition, 4.6cm is generally classified as an Aortic Aneurysm. I have also read this may be a congenital hereditary condition. My old man had surgery on an abdominal aneurysm a few years back, but he was close to 70 when this happened. I am with a Cardiologist this coming Wednesday.

Its safe to say I am absolutely crushed by this. Im an ex Paratrooper and Commando, and spent my entire life dedicated to the pursuit of health and fitness.

Any advise or info would be much appreciated, especially on any exercise related topics.

Cheers

Daryl

 

[pellicle]

Welcome aboard

Any advise or info would be much appreciated, especially on any exercise related topics.

Mine was over 5.3cm when identified. At 4.6 it warrants regular examination to begin charting it's growth rates. So I expect they'll do a study now and another in 3 months.

So panic isn't needed.
Exercise is still needed, but focus on reps and aerobic more than maximum lifting capacity.

You'll be fine

 

[Daryl]

Welcome aboard



Mine was over 5.3cm when identified. At 4.6 it warrants regular examination to begin charting it's growth rates. So I expect they'll do a study now and another in 3 months.

So panic isn't needed.
Exercise is still needed, but focus on reps and aerobic more than maximum lifting capacity.

You'll be fine

Hey bud,

Thanks for the reply. Could I ask if you had any symptoms previous to your diagnoses?

It’s the risk of stroke that’s really messing with my head

 

[user 16827]

Hey Daryl welcome.

Uk based fitness nut too .

It's early days and you'll have lots of questions.

TIA can happen yes, oftentimes during or post intense exercise, it's good that you are seeing your cardio soon as he /she will offer some tailored advice based on you and the family history .

Following the Echo are you aware if your valve is Bicuspid ?

BAV is linked to a higher probability of aneurysm.

Your Cardio may ( or may not ) prescribe meds at this point.

Given your stroke concern the main thing is as mentioned : control your BP.

Spikes are best avoided, think Max deadlifts.

Steady state cardio will increase BP but in a more friendly and gradual way.

Take comfort in the fact that this place is full of fitness nuts, some pre and others like myself, post surgery.

Like i said its early days mate.

To answer your last question, in my case yes.

Lots of vacant episodes after races, these were put down to TIA.
My memory was shot for a few days at a time & i had vision issues.
A reduction in effort really helped me.

 

[Paleowoman]

Hi Daryl - welcome to the forum. I haven't had a TIA and I don't think I have a dilated aorta ascending aorta though it looks wider on CT scan that the rest of my aorta. I had a bicuspid aortic valve, first discovered when I was 25. I had surgery to replace the valve with a biological tissue valve when I was 60, meanwhile I did weight lifting, quite heavy for a woman, to keep me as fit as possible. I'll have to have redo surgery at some point as tissue valves don't last forever.

You should get some answers from the cardiologist when you see him on Wednesday !

PS - you'll get a lot of support from this forum !

 

[Dano64]

Daryl,
I had aortic valve surgery for BAV in 2001 and for years my cardiologist never checked for ascending aneurysm despite the medical literature connecting the two. So, when first discovered at 4.8, I too freaked out. I was then sent to my surgeon who calmed me down significantly and told me it wasn't an emergency. I was followed for 3.5 years before I had surgery 2/2022. I currently feel great. Do a Google search on Arnold Schwarzeneger and you will see he has had a few heart surgeries and he is still pretty fit and hasn't slowed down too much. There are a lot of people on this site who stay quite fit through this. I expect you will hear from them. Best wishes to you!

 

[Croooser]

What others have already said. Suggest that you really focus in on the 4.6. In this country a CT scan is the definitive test for aortic aneurysm. If the 4.6 is coming from an echo, it would be worth getting a CT scan to double check. Some of us have gone many years until we reach 5.0. I, personally had some echos that varied by as much as .2 from a CT scan at the same basic point in time.

In any event, the good news is that you have a heads up so that you can monitor your condition. We all wish that we did not develop these conditions, but we are all really glad that the vast majority of us have been successfully treated.

 

[pellicle]

Thanks for the reply. Could I ask if you had any symptoms previous to your diagnoses?

I didn't and to the best of my knowledge there are no symptoms that present with aneurysm, it's simply the risk of the wall of the artery tearing (called a dissection) and you then pretty quickly die.

The risk increases as the diameter approaches a figure over 5cm

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1861012/
Stroke isn't a risk from that (that I've heard), but is a risk from a calcified aortic valve (usually associated with stenosis) , which I didn't see in your post. However as you mentioned hereditary issue with your aneurysm it may be you have a bicuspid aortic valve, which until now was not interfering with your activities.

Best get some studies done and tone down any high intensity training for now. Remember, training is for health, and being dead or suffering an actual stroke isn't healthy

For your anxiety, from the Stoics

From Dune

 

[vitdoc]

I assume that when you said you had a TIA that you had some neurological event which was transient and you recovered. To me that is much more significant than the 4.6 cm aorta. The enlarged aorta should have little to do with having a TIA. As mentioned by others it needs to be watched but is not a high risk issue currently. Evaluation of the carotid arteries and a good echo looking for a open foramen ovale are useful. It is fairly rare for 46 year old people to have TIAs. History of significant increased lipids, high blood pressure and especially smoking are all risk factors to be checked. No mention of A fib was made so I assume that has not been noted either.
Good luck with the evaluation but don't freak out about the aorta right now.

 

[pellicle]

It is fairly rare for 46 year old people to have TIAs. History of significant increased lipids, high blood pressure and especially smoking are all risk factors to be checked. No mention of A fib was made so I assume that has not been noted either.

this is quite interesting to me as I've only just uncovered that @leadville had an uncalcified and un-stenotic BAV well into late adulthood. I did some digging because "this was news to me" and found this:
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2776200

In childhood, BAV is typically asymptomatic and diagnosed incidentally, whereas in adulthood, the diagnosis is often identified because of complications, eg, valvular dysfunction (aortic valve stenosis, aortic valve regurgitation, or both) and/or aortic aneurysm or aortic dissection.2,4,8,11 Interventions are eventually required in the majority of patients with BAV.11,12 Patients diagnosed early with BAV and followed up on a regular basis have the same life expectancy as the general population.13​

​

Because of limited data on patients diagnosed with normally or near-normally functioning BAV, there is uncertainty about the true risk of complications related to BAV in the general population.​

so I thought I'd share it here {bold mine}. So I suspect that because I've mainly seen discussion with BAV that was associated with being identified by valvular dysfunction (aortic valve stenosis, aortic valve regurgitation, or both) then I was a bit surprised that it hadn't been mentioned in the case of @Daryl and was why I suggested it above

 

[Raoul]

I was 25 when they discovered my aneurysm and it was around 46mm, now after 20 years its 49mm and they still would whait with surger was it not that my valve is realy bad now and need to be replaced soon. So i would not stress that mutch. Normal they will do something when its bigger then 50mm and that can take awile....

Good luck

 

[pellicle]

Its safe to say I am absolutely crushed by this. Im an ex Paratrooper and Commando, and spent my entire life dedicated to the pursuit of health and fitness.

I thought this deserved a distinct and separate response.

If you had a bung water valve in your house you wouldn't despair for the house right?

If you had an enemy to face up to you wouldn't despair about that either right?

Now you've discovered that your enemy is simply an aspect of your biology (chalk up another one against the intelligent design nutbags) and it is in reality distinct from your mind and your consciousness.

The plumbing problem is fixable and to be honest aside from the "getting in and getting out" is a simple fix (a new bit of plumbing pipe and a valve) and no big deal really.

I had a plumbing fix when I was 10 and went on to travel (from my native Australia) and take a few adventures. I spent some years in Finland doing XC skiing, a blog post from 2 years before I even knew I had an aneurysm (5.6cm IIRC)

http://cjeastwd.blogspot.com/2010/02/bad-skiing.html
This is taken a little after that last surgery (Nov 2011), when I had my 3'rd plumbing fix) after some complications (don't ask) and I was able to get back to ski training again

I was 50 then

However anything that you or I do will likely be eclipsed by this lady who had a mechanical valve (like mine) and an aneurysm fixed.
https://www.newsweek.com/my-turn-climbing-everest-bionic-heart-99749
So now you know that you've got weeks or months (maybe years) to quietly learn about the strategy and then the tactics involved with defeating your internal enemy.

Just be glad it wasn't your cells that turned on you (cancer), for that's a harder battle and often lost. OHS and valve replacement and aortic grafts are highly successful.

Best wishes

 

[Rocket John]

Hi everyone,

My name is Daryl, I am 46, and I’m from the UK. I’m very happy to have found this group, and hope hearing from other people will help to inform me and calm my anxiety down, which at the moment is through the frickin roof.

I had a TIA stroke 3 weeks ago. On investigation my echocardiogram came back with a Dilated ascending aortic root and aorta of 4.6cm. On reading up on this condition, 4.6cm is generally classified as an Aortic Aneurysm. I have also read this may be a congenital hereditary condition. My old man had surgery on an abdominal aneurysm a few years back, but he was close to 70 when this happened. I am with a Cardiologist this coming Wednesday.

Its safe to say I am absolutely crushed by this. Im an ex Paratrooper and Commando, and spent my entire life dedicated to the pursuit of health and fitness.

Any advise or info would be much appreciated, especially on any exercise related topics.

Cheers

Daryl

Hi Daryl. I had aortic valve replaced, porcine at 47. I was always very active and fit. I was shocked by how much better I felt post surgery. More energy. I continued to compete as a rodeo cowboy and work out like a maniac. Go get it.

 

[ValveAdmin]

Welcome to the forum, Daryl. Good luck with your appointment with your cardiologist.