The lessons weren’t necessarily accurate.
For as long as I can remember – and I bet you can say the same – Heart Attacks have been common in pop culture. Depicted in commercials, television shows, and movies – you hear about them almost every day. In a sitcom, a Heart Attack might be used for a throw away laugh in a forgotten gimmick. On the silver screen, a Heart Attack might be the rising action in a drama or the catalyst of a different characters “Coming of Age” story arch. In a commercial, fear of a sudden Heart Attack might be used to encourage you to buy more aspirin.
Whatever the case is… We see Heart Attacks depicted all the time.
Which is exactly why I DIDN’T think I was having one. And that almost cost me my life. Allow me to explain…
The first time I encountered a dramatic reenactment of a heart attack was in fifth grade, when I read Gracy Paulsen’s famous book “Hatchet.” In that story, teenager Brian Robeson is the sole passenger on a single engine plane flying over the Canadian wilderness. During the flight, Brian takes note – I kid you not- of the pilot’s distinct flatulence. Then things get worse – the pilot suffers a Heart Attack and dies. Brian attempts to fly the plane on his own, but ends up crashing into a lake. The Heart Attack, in this example, caused relatively instant death and a plane crash. Nothing Subtle there.
Later, I can vividly recall a Bayer Aspirin commercial that got lots of play time in the 90’s and early 2000’s. You probably remember it… In this particular spot, a middle-aged father and his college-aged son are playing a classic game of basketball in the driveway. Things are going great until, suddenly, the father’s health takes a turn for the worse. At this point in the commercial, things switch to slow-motion as the father clutches his chest. By the look on his face and his body language you would assume that the very ground beneath him was shaking. It is evident, it is obvious, it is unmistakable… this man is having a Heart Attack.. But, you know…. thank God for Bayer Aspirin.
Much later, I became a fan of NBC’s hit show “The Office.” In a fifth season double episode titled “Stress Relief,” resident eager beaver Dwight Schrute takes it upon himself to test his co-workers fire preparedness. He does this – naturally – by setting an actual fire in the office. The heat is turned up a notch -see what I did there – when Dwight disables the office’s routes of escape. In the chaos that ensues Kevin breaks into the snack machine, Oscar hoists himself into the roof to get help. Angela pulls a pet cat out of a drawer, Dwight lights fireworks, and Michael implores everyone to “STAY FU***NG CALM!”
Somewhere in the fray, office curmudgeon Stanley appears to be experiencing physical distress. When Dwight blows an air horn and reveals this was all a simulated drill, Stanley collapses and hits the ground unconscious. It is revealed, later, that he suffered a Heart Attack.
What all three of these examples have in common is… drama. This makes sense – fictitious reenactments need to grab your attention. They need danger, laughter, or both. The result, though, is that the viewer comes to understand Heart Attacks to be accompanied by literal ground shaking traits. Furthermore, in all these scenarios, the people around the victims all know that something is wrong. It might not be immediately obvious that a heart attack is occurring, but it’s clear and evident that an emergency is taking place. There was no need to sit and debate “Are you sure you’re feeling alright?”
This is the case in plenty of other examples, too, like Garry / Jerry / Terry
Gergich on “Parks and Recreation,” or Roger Sterling on “Mad Men.” The list goes on and on.
The result, for me at least, is that I had ample reason to believe I was
NOT having a heart attack. Surely this is just heart burn, I told myself. “I’ve had heart burn before, this is no big deal.” For HOURS I sat in solidarity with my belief that I was perfectly fine because all the evidence told me so. I was having no trouble breathing, standing, speaking, or walking. The ground beneath me didn’t appear to be shaking. I was lucid and had not spontaneously collapsed. Surely I wasn’t having a heart attack. Right?
Wrong.
In addition to the physical signs of a Heart Attack, popular culture does a lot to shape our perceptions of the individuals that would normally experience a Heart Attack in the first place. Heart Attack victims, by and large, are usually presented as older. Perhaps not Senior Citizens, but they’re often portrayed as having adult Children or even grandchildren. Characters with heart problems are often also portrayed with obvious co-morbidities, like obvious obesity or respiratory issues such as asthma. Again – I had ample reason to assume I was perfectly fine. I was young. I was not obese. I didn’t smoke. My blood pressure is notoriously low and healthy.
The potential for damage that these conceptions pose is obvious. Even among those typically associated with Heart Attack risk (smokers, seniors, the obese) symptoms are not always the same. Patients in a hospital’s heart ward would likely all describe unique circumstances that brought them there. What’s more, men… the characters portrayed almost exclusively as having Heart Attacks… experience pain and discomfort that is almost completely different than when women experience one.
But here common conceptions pose even greater potential risk to young people. More likely to feel a youthful invincibility, younger folks are less likely to have compounding factors typically associated – in the media – with Heart Attacks. This is especially alarming considering the increase, statistically, in Heart Attack rates among Americans between the ages of 25 and 44 since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Further analysis of these issues, and answers to the questions inevitably raised, is likely a discussion for another day. For now, though, I think the message is pretty clear: Heart Attacks, in the real world, do not necessarily fit into the cliche boxes that we tend to put them into. Where Hollywood might portray the bellwethers as cataclysmic or larger than life, the human condition often delivers them in much subtler ways. The danger, though, is that the (perhaps) subtlety of an actual Heart Attack does not guarantee a more subtle outcome.
Ask me how I know.
slimredcobb. 