My origin story: I was born on Bigstone Cree Nation, a reserve in Wabasca, Alberta. I lived there with my parents and two siblings until I was six years old. Then one day, I was flown into Edmonton to Charles Camsell Hospital which took care of tuberculosis (TB) patients. I was in hospital for about two years and it was just my father who was able to visit a few times because the reserves were so far away from the city. He came, because as a trapper, he could travel to the city with other travellers to sell their furs. And he was only able to travel at night at that time. It wasn’t until 1960 that Indigenous people could travel around freely.

On my first trip to the hospital, I didn’t know what has happening. My mother just told me I was sick. I was coughing a lot. We had a small house but didn’t have a lot of people living there, although we always had a lot of company in all the time.

The first little while at the hospital, I cried all the time due to loneliness. I didn’t know I had many relatives in the hospital. They cut your hair off! I made it through there and, after two years, I went home. By then, my father had moved our family to Pickardville, just outside of Edmonton. My father found work with the railroad then, so that made it easy for us to get around by rail.

I spent most of my life in northern Alberta, mostly in and around Edmonton. I’ve lived in Nanaimo with my husband, Doug, since August 2016.

My age: I’m 74, but most days I feel 50.

Occupation: I was the founder of the Aboriginal Women’s Professional Association (AWPA) in Edmonton. I was with the AWPA for about 12 years. It was the job I left when we moved to BC. I was the executive director there until 2012.

Before that, I worked for Alberta Government Telephones (which became Telus) for 26 years. Out of that, I was in management for 15 years.

Professionally, I did a lot of contract work and it came from the fact that I was in Toastmasters. I was with Toastmasters for about 16 years and I eventually got my Distinguished Toastmaster Award. It opened up a whole new world for me and allowed me to become self-employed.

After I left Telus, I had to figure out what to do. When I was with Toastmasters, I was training Aboriginal clients which incorporated Toastmasters’ training. I did training between my jobs and in the evenings as a volunteer. I did it to help people improve themselves.

I also took extension courses at the University of Alberta, which eventually led me to obtaining an Adult Education degree. I received an Honorary Doctorate in Law in 2015 from Athabasca University. I worked with several universities on a contract basis, such as the University of Alberta and Grant MacEwan College - now MacEwan University. It was all related to improving the lives of Aboriginal women.

I eventually retired but still had a lot of volunteer work that I was doing. No one took over. I still get calls from the City of Edmonton to do the training.

My stroke experience

My doctors think that all of my work may have contributed to my health issues. I’ve always been a real determined hard worker. No matter what was going on in my life, I’ve always got things done. The consequence was my health – I thought I was invincible! Then I got struck down.

In 1981, I had a stroke while I was home at the time. That morning, I wasn’t feeling well. In fact, I felt horrible, but I felt I had to go to work. My husband Doug drove me to work but, on the way home I took the bus, fell asleep, and missed my stop. Doug found me at the next stop and took me home. When we got home, I was too tired to make dinner so we had sandwiches. Then I had a shower and went to bed.

There had been something strange happening to me that day. As I got ready to leave that day from work, my boss asked me to proofread a letter that had to be sent out from my office. I looked at it and told him that there were black spots on the letter and I couldn’t read it. He laughed and said, “See you tomorrow,” and left. This is an incident that proved I had decreased blood flow that caused poor concentration, as I was on my way to a stroke.

Around 9:30 pm, Doug could tell something was wrong. I was unable to move on my right side and unable to speak. So he called his sister and she said, “Call an ambulance right away,” and off we went.

I remember waking up at the hospital and the doctors were massaging my legs and arms and looking into my eyes. They said I looked perfectly healthy and asked, “Is she on drugs, is she a drinker, an alcoholic?” And Doug said, “No!”

I was in hospital for two weeks and they didn’t let me go home until I could figure out what time it was. Every day, I thought the clock said two o’clock. The doctors couldn’t say what caused the whole incident other than stress and suggested that I was taking too many Tylenol. Around that time, I’d had constant headaches so I was always taking Tylenol.

In 1981, when I did have some tests done, the machines didn’t show an aneurysm on my skull. Today they’ve got the technology to see that I do have an aneurysm. The doctors never confirmed a stroke, they said I was too young for it (I was 35) and that I was healthy! I still get occasional headaches.

My heart health experience

On February 17, 2016, in Nanaimo, I experienced severe chest pains. This was the scenario: We had company at the time, as my husband’s brother and his wife were visiting us. We had been travelling around Comox and other places. While we were travelling, I had a sore left arm and kept rubbing it. My sister-in-law asked, “What’s causing that?” No one knew and I forgot about it. I said to them on the Saturday, “Why don’t you take the day off and come back by 5 pm and I will have supper ready.”

I’m a Lions Club member and I had some work to do on a project working with students doing vision screening. On that day, my girlfriend was waiting for me, but I was delayed due to chest pains. She was waiting for me at the school, which was about 10 minutes from my house. But because I was late, she eventually phoned me to ask if I was coming to do the screening. I said, “I’m on my way,” even though I had chest pains.

So, I drove to the school to meet her, and my girlfriend said I looked really pale. Then I told her that I didn’t feel good, and that I had to go to the bathroom because I felt like I was going to throw up. But when I got to the bathroom, I was fine. She decided to take me to the Nanaimo hospital.

Diagnosis: Heart attack

We were waiting to get checked in and I was in pain. Finally, they took me in, hooked me up to machines, and did some tests. I wanted to sleep but I was afraid to sleep. Then the doctor came in and said, “Mrs. Clark, you’re having a heart attack and we’re sending you to Victoria for treatment.” My girlfriend called my husband and told him. At that point, he and my in-laws were on their way home from Comox.

The hospital staff told Doug he could come with me in the ambulance. They were originally going to call for a helicopter but it was sleeting outside so they couldn’t fly. In the ambulance, the paramedics were great. I felt like throwing up, and going to the bathroom, (these were sensations), but they gave me medication and I slept all the way. Once we got to Victoria, they were all prepared for me at the Royal Jubilee Hospital.

Weakened heart muscle

They opened my wrist and put in a tube and performed an angiogram. I was told I had Takotsubo cardiomyopathy. My heart muscle was suddenly weakened or stressed. It’s also called broken heart syndrome.

So, the doctor asked what I’d been doing recently and I explained I had retired and had just moved to Nanaimo about six months earlier. The doctor said, “That’s it, you’re probably missing your friends and family.”

Plus, my previous life had been so busy and stressful that it could have contributed to my heart condition. And that was it. The Victoria doctors told me I’d had 40 per cent blockage in my heart but I didn’t have any stents put in. They treated my blockage with medication.

They also told me I had an aneurysm at the base of my skull, but it can’t be surgically removed because it’s in too sensitive an area. So, I see a cardiologist about once or twice a year for that. It will probably increase to up to three appointments a year.

Ongoing treatment

I’m on three heart pills: Candesartan for high blood pressure, Metoprolol for angina and hypertension, and a statin, Atorvastatin. But my overall health is pretty good. The headaches I’d had for years are almost gone now. I went to see a specialist in Victoria and she told me she thought it was my eyes because I’d had surgery in my eyes.

I went to see another heart specialist who looked at the aneurysm and told me that I just have to “be careful”. You can only see it with an X-ray. I still get dizzy and I get the aneurysm checked regularly. The doctor does a blood test first and always says I’m still healthy, but they don’t know what’s caused the aneurysm. The cardiologist that I am now seeing advised that the aneurysm could be the cause for headaches.

What are the benefits of belonging to the Nanaimo Heart Sisters?

After you have a heart attack, the doctor tells you about these health courses. I met Diane Shipclark as a referral from someone who knew Diane, and she encouraged me to join the group. I joined in 2017.

I just like to hear how everybody’s doing. My incidents seem like a dot on the wall as to what everybody else is experiencing. Nobody looks sickly, other than a couple of women, so it makes me feel like, “Wow, I got away good.” Nothing stops me and I keep busy hiking, walking, and volunteering with the Nanaimo Lions Club. I love the Heart Sisters’ gatherings! I don’t think of my heart incident as serious as it is, but I enjoy the gatherings we get from the monthly meetings.

Read more about Takotsubo cardiomyopathy at Takotsubo – When stress breaks your heart