For this blog post, I'm turning the reins over to my dad.  He's going to share his story of having heart disease, and how stress was a contributing factor to his illness.

Claude Moulton Esq. writes:

Quite unexpectedly at age 50 I was diagnosed with coronary artery disease. I had no symptoms of which I was aware. I was taking a physical and as an afterthought mentioned that I had some back pain when I exercised (who doesn't?). A series of tests revealed that I had two totally and several partially blocked coronary arteries. The pain was in my back, in contrast to "chest pain," because the blocked arteries were at the back of my heart.

I tried drug therapy and angioplasty, but eventually had double bypass surgery. That was 15 years ago and I have had excellent tests results since then.

What was unexpected about my diagnosis was that I had none of the risk factors normally associated with heart disease: family history of heart trouble, smoking, overweight, lack of exercise, diabetes, high blood pressure, poor diet, advanced age. In fact, even though I changed my diet radically after the diagnosis, that had only negligible impact on my cholesterol levels. While I still am careful about what I put in my mouth, only statins lower my cholesterol.