Healthy heart, happy heart

There’s the number of days a month that she spends away from her new home in Ottawa as a shining star on the international opera circuit and judge on CityTV’s Canada’s Got Talent: 18. Then there’s 180 — the number of pounds she lost a few years ago to build stamina for her gruelling tour dates. She also remembers 260/180, her out-of-control blood pressure reading in 2009 — when she was just 31. And her favourite number of all? That would be 13, or the percentage of people who actually survive what she experienced on a June day three years ago, when her blood pressure grew so intense, it actually ripped a hole through the wall of her aorta, the heart's main artery. “Usually they find that you’ve had an aortic tear in the autopsy; it has an 87-per-cent mortality rate,” says Brueggergosman, now 34. “So I’m in the lucky 13 per cent.” It’s not a statistic she takes lightly. As spokesperson for the Becel/Heart and Stroke Foundation’s The Heart Truth campaign, the soprano not only ‘‘knows her numbers” such as cholesterol levels, weight and blood pressure, she’s urging other women to learn theirs too. According to Statistics Canada, heart disease is the leading killer of women, causing roughly seven times more deaths than breast cancer and five to six more deaths than lung disease. “Many women think cancer is the leading cause of death, particularly breast cancer,” says Dr. Andrew Pipe, director of the University of Ottawa Heart Institute's prevention and rehabilitation unit. “But the leading cause of death while being treated for breast cancer is heart attack. Women have as much heart disease as men, and once they reach menopause, their rate increases significantly.” Then there are the unseen risk factors, such as stress and putting others first. “Women take on more responsibility, but they neglect themselves more and more in the process,” Brueggergosman observes. “Heart health is not something you can neglect. That’s why I tell people that taking care of your health is like making sure you put your oxygen mask on first in an airplane emergency. If you can’t take care of your health, you can’t take care of others.” Ironically, it took a near-death experience to make Brueggergosman realize that putting other things first, like her career, was endangering her life. Despite having a strong family history of cardiovascular disease — her athletic, hockey-playing father had a heart attack at 38 (and later a quadruple bypass) and her grandparents plus two aunts succumbed before they were 50 — she led a hectic, stressful and weight-gaining lifestyle as a rising young star of Canadian opera. “I was, for the most part, active as a kid growing up in Fredericton,” she says. “I speed-skated and played rugby. But once I started university, I started gaining more and more weight. It was neglect and a lack of education. I was naïve enough to think I had to be 40 to have a heart attack.” Nothing could be further from the truth. While awaiting a table at a trendy Toronto restaurant in summer 2009, she “started to feel numbness in my fingers. It was blood being redirected as my aorta was splitting.” Initially diagnosed with high blood pressure in the emergency room, she was back at the hospital the next day, complaining of chest pain. She immediately underwent open-heart surgery to repair the tear. “We were in Nova Scotia when we got the call and were in Toronto the next afternoon,” remembers her mother Ann Gosman, who has joined her daughter in the Becel campaign. “At that point, she’d lost weight, got into exercising and was taking care of herself. Her dad kept reminding her to watch her blood work. We thought ‘she’s doing lifestyle changes and she should be OK.’ But that was not the case.” Since then, Brueggergosman has made the kinds of changes that gladden the hearts of cardiac experts. Influenced by her mother, who says “women don’t think heart disease is an issue ... but you mention breast cancer and they’re on it,” she gets regular checkups and blood work. And while she says that “sometimes, you lose the medical lottery” due to bad genes, “I do everything I can to put me on the winning side.” Already a Bikram yoga devotee, Brueggergosman became an instructor and now guest teaches wherever she goes. She watches her diet, eats “salad and meat or salad and fish,” avoids “any food that makes me tired,” drinks “tons of water” and takes blood pressure medication. And when not on the road, she relaxes at home with her husband Markus, who is studying at Algonquin College to become a paramedic. “My husband is way more of a homebody, so we need that balance. I really enjoy Ottawa. I like hockey and skating on the Rideau Canal, so it’s a no-brainer,” says Brueggergosman, who will sing the national anthem at the Ottawa Senators’ game against the Pittsburgh Penguins on March 24. (While living in Toronto, she says, she cheered both the Sens and the Leafs, but admits to a deep admiration for Leafs’ defenceman Jeff Gardiner’s elegant skating. “It’s a thing of beauty. And yes, I’m free for coffee, Mr. Gardiner.”) But perhaps most importantly, she says, “what I’ve learned is that by stepping back from the action, I have a sense of what I like, what stresses me out, and it’s ultimately my family who will benefit. I wasn’t necessarily thinking ‘kids’ before I almost died. It wasn’t like I was avoiding having kids, but it hadn’t become a priority. I grew up without grandparents, but I see my parents as grandparents and I think, ‘My kids could have that. I could have that.’ ”