I am writing this is because often I feel compelled to let my customers know my story when I see them face to face. It can be upsetting for me sometimes telling this story and on occasions just telling it is enough to make me unwell. Thing is, I’m really not the overweight, monotone, unfit person they see in front of them – I’m a totally different person who is trapped in a body with a heart that’s stopping him being who he would dearly love to be. I’m over telling the story so I put it down here for everyone who is interested enough to read. A good friend said to me not many weeks ago writing things down can sometimes help, so I guess time will tell.
IN A HAPPY PLACE…
Recently I have again had to spend a few nights in what I feel has become my second home – my local hospital. I have never really gone into detail on my Social Media about my ongoing health issue although a lot of you will know i have a heart condition. I almost feel like there is a stigma attached to it “having heart issues” and I’m ashamed to be a sufferer. I have looked after my heart, I have never smoked, I have never been drunk, I have never touched drugs, I have been an athlete all my life; my heart should have out lived me and then some.
But the fact is I do have a heart condition and it is a pretty serious one, I have ARVC, or Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Cardiomyopathy, and there is no cure or miracle fix. When your specialist sits opposite you and mentions heart transplants you all of a sudden appreciate just how bad the outlook could be.
It was a sudden onset, in March 2014, and it hit me like a hammer. I am finding it extremely difficult to come to terms with its seriousness.
My whole life has been spent flat out on the edge pushing my limits whether that was wheels or snow, throttle or endurance.
McLEAN, McROY AND KIPLING – NATIONAL DOWNHILL CHAMPIONSHIP SUCCESS
I had a career in the early days of MTB in the UK, racing high level XC when the races were three hour plus slogs, then to elite level Downhill racing. I was a silver medalist at the UK championships behind to the late great Jason McRoy. I raced at both World and European championships and it was a massive and fantastic part of my life.
When I retired from that chapter I took to snowboarding, motocross, track events on my superbike; the speed and danger and thrill were always close by.
Being as competitive as I was, this was a phase of my life filled with broken bones and time out recovering. Motor bikes bite a bit harder than mountain bikes!
KNEE DOWN ADRENALINE ADDICT
But after about five years of beating myself up I decided that being really fit was more important to me than the time out these other sports were causing me. Risk verses reward and all that. Old bones take too long to fix. Half of you reading this will think I’m talking crap. Give it 10 years and you may understand that statement a little more.
I made the decision to get back to a healthy pastime but I was in a quandary – I had no clue what to do. I was never going to replace that feeling of being one of the very best in my country that I had back in my downhilling career.
So I opted on Ironman triathlon. I spent six years training and racing these events, after all it was an achievement just to finish the distances – 3.9km swim, 180 k ride, 42km run – but it gave me some focus and structure and got me into good shape again. Oh yeah, and I didn’t break any bones.
FINISHING IRON MAN….SNOW FUN….& LANDS END – JOHN O’GROATS WITH DARREN
Stop Pushing
However my push at all cost nature did cost me, I was a county level swimmer as a kid, and found I could leave the swim in front of a few pro ironman athletes and this drove me to put more time into the pool and caused my “lose” shoulder joint, (too many big MTB and MX bike crashes) to wobble in its socket and sever my rotator cuff. My continual pushing without noticing the seriousness of this injury led to three surgeries and over two years of being Mr Grumpy and sat out of sport of all kind. Well, apart from fishing but that’s a whole other story.
When my shoulder rehab had finished I got back on a bike, “Swimming was not advised” so just the road bike mainly and a bit on my ironman/TT bike. Slowly at first, but my passion to go further and faster was just as strong as it was 20+ years before back when I first took to an MTB. My rides got longer, I got stronger and faster so I entered a few TT races, as I could not face riding my MTB at this time. I was too heavy, too slow and I knew how fast I used to be on all my local trails. I could not take the mental beating that riding them slowly would cause. The TT/road racing and road miles were a base to give me the strength I needed in my head to go and enjoy the MTB again. It took 18 months, but by then I had won a few road races and was starting a winning streak of TTs – that was never expected seems I could still win races in a “small pond”. And, to be honest, it was great beating 20 year olds at 40.
CUSTOM LIDS AND FRAMES – FATCREATIONS IS FORMING..
Fast forward a few great years on the bike to late one night after a pretty amazing day to be honest. My life changed forever.
Bearing in mind for the previous four months I didn’t have a single week where I had not ridden 300 miles on the bike in preparation for the up coming season I was confused to feel slightly weak after walking up to my bed. But not too worried about it. It took me about 45 minutes to realise my heart was racing – it turned out it was 280 beats per min or a non life sustainable ventricular tachycardia, SVT.
After much contemplation I decided to go to the hospital. Well the absolute truth was my little boy happened to be sleeping in my bed that night and as I looked at him after deciding I’d be ok to go to bed, I thought ‘fuck, he can not wake up next to a dead daddy.’ Hand on broken heart, if he was not in my bed that night I would not be here now telling you all about this I would have passed away in my sleep.
So off to hospital it was. By now it was 1am and I had been in this condition for 90 minutes. On arriving at the hospital they could not understand my alertness; I felt odd yes, but I did not feel my life was at risk, How wrong I was.
I laid in crash waiting for the doctors to make a decision.They were perplexed my BP was completely normal and this made no sense with a VT of almost 300 bpm. Thirty minutes later things started to change my vital signs were dropping off, it was clear my heart had no intention of sorting its self out so it was, SHOCK time. The docs put me to sleep and give me a cardioversion, “defib” shock my heart dropped back into sinus rhythm and they bought me back round,
My reaction was. “right then thank you I’ll be off now. “Mr McLean you are going nowhere”. Shocked. My answer was “but I’m fine now.”
AFTER MY FIRST DEFIB’. AND DECEMBER 2016 WHEN MY ICD DIDN’T DEAL WITH MY HAYWIRE HEART SO THEY HAD TO DEFIB ME AGAIN.
Indescribable Force
Pretty much the next month was spent being at my local hospital and Southampton general, in the end they fitted a big lump of titanium in my chest much to my opposition; but it was pretty much the only way I was going to get out of that place and I had missed four weeks of training at the most important time of the year. Weird what you worry about. I left hospital albeit a few hundred grams heaver with a nasty bit of kit slipped under my pectoral muscle. And a wire leaving that and weaving its way through an artery into the center of my heart.
It was two weeks before I had my first ride, it was all good for the first 30 of a short 35 mile off road ride but coming home up the last big climb my defib went off “by mistake.” The force had me off my bike The force was indescribable. Jay, a friend who was the only one who had kept close was just in front of me on this climb, had no clue the details of my hospital visit, or that I had a bomb fitted in my chest. My outburst of torrents from behind shocked him as much as my device shocked me. I tried to hide it from the group but it was Bex who guessed what had happened and so we took a direct route home. I had a bit of a fight with the hospital as I had expressed my concern of having the ICD ‘Defib’ set active from 166bpm. I explained I spent hours each week with a higher heart rate than that. And did not want any inappropriate treatment! They agreed to set my device according to my wishes this time so it was dormant till 220BPM this was 30 beats above my max heat rate so I figured if I got a shock I needed it. However, I did have some anxiety issues after that first blow, and my first few time trials were a struggle. The devil on one shoulder saying Ali you feel odd mate you should not be this out of breath; the angel on the other side saying don’t be a dick Ali you are flat out chill man it’s just anxiety. It took about six races to get my confidence back and within ten events I had dipped into the 20 min time bracket for a ten-mile TT. Considering my six weeks off the bike and everything else I was pretty happy.
I did a few enduro races and made the podium in the Pro class “remember; small pond”
I was fast compared to the local rippers so always entered Pro; who wants to win the vets cat when they can have a proper race in with the local Pros was my attitude.
So I raced for the next four months twice a week minimum and won a fair few “in my little pond”. I was kind of dealing with having this lump in my chest ok, after all I still had my racing even if I was told to knock it on the head. And life was still fairly normal.
Time To Be Fucked Up
August 5th 2014, my first ablation. An ablation is a operation that is supposed to burn off and reduce the scar tissue which is disrupting a heart rhythm. Basically you stay completely conscious with no anesthetic at all. They cut into your femoral artery, insert a catheter and push it up the artery and into the heart where they try to locate and burn the areas effected with disease. It hurts and you feel it but you have to lay there still as you can. Pretty hard when they have been pumping adrenalin into your heart and you are in a non life sustainable VT; yep, they are supposed to trip your heart into VT before they burn, I will add in the first operation they were unable to get my heart to go into VT but they burnt anyway.
Anyway in the previous four months I had not one single VT episode all the miles all the racing and no problem at all, but it was considered dangerous having the Implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) fitted when I was going to continue racing on public roads and in close proximity to big immovable trees. Due to the explosive nature of having a defib shock while riding, we decided the ablation fix was a good option. Wrong. Worst decision of my life.
But I had the ablation and three weeks later I did my first ride. I was advised two weeks recovery was plenty. I had what i thought were three savage panic attacks, that’s really not like me but that’s all i could describe them as. But two weeks later I was dismayed when I went for a check up to discover that I had suffered a serious repetitive episode of VTs. I was distraught (you promised to fucking fix me what have you done?). I left the hospital on a massive downer completely beside myself, and the next day went out on my mountain bike in what I can only describe as a suicidal self destruct frame of mind. Up one climb I had 13 successive VTs; I knew I was having them but I just kept pushing at maximum effort for the whole 90 min ride. Next morning the hospital called to inform me I had had 28 VTs and what ever I was doing it had to stop it immediately. They were extremely concerned. How did they know so fast? Because my ICD sent data remotely as I lay asleep in bed. The hospital had never seen anything like it.
In the six months from that first operation I managed a total of 172 miles on my bike –
almost half my winter weekly mileage. I was so lost.
The Rise of Fatcreations
Now all of a sudden I had 16 plus hours to fill each week i.e the time I’d be on my bike training or racing – and another 25 or so hours which would be relaxation and recovery time after riding hard. I was idle and my brain was racing. I really had to be busy or risk losing my mind or worse. So I just kept saying yes to paint jobs. And Fatcreations grew into quite a monster within a few months.
Operation No.2. February came around and I was off to London again for a second ablation. Another five hours laying completely conscious on the operating table while your heart gets burnt. Its pretty horrible. But I was optimistic so enduring it was bearable, after all I needed my life back. A few weeks later I went out for a few easy rides. Quickly found out I was much more stable. Basically as long as i kept my heart rate below 170 bpm i rarely got VT problems but above 170 was bad. Basically I could ride safe but I could no longer race safe. I still did but it got scary at times.
My surgeon at the time said he thought he could get me sorted if I could face and endure a third operation. Obviously there was no way I could say no. Up until now a normal life was do-able and I only had the VTs while training hard. ”Normal” life was ok.
FIRST OPERATION. HAMMERSMITH, LONDON.
Next biggest mistake of my life.
Six months later I was on the operating table again. This time it was going to go badly wrong. I won’t go into the details, but the last two hours of that five hour plus operation were traumatic. To the point where I begged them to put me out. But you have to be alert and with it during treatment so I had to stay calm and conscious it was the hardest few hours I have had to deal with. Basically they had done some abating that caused me to be so unstable it was frightening. I could see it in the eyes of the guys working on me. Let alone feel it in my chest. It was one step forward two steps back for too long. I even said to my surgeon, “Nick its not going great is it”, he frowned and said, “We are struggling Alistair but we have more to do yet try to stay calm”. I was coming apart inside; personally I think as soon as they got me stable enough to leave that theatre they called the operation done.
I knew right away I was in the shit. Laying in recovery at resting heart rate I had a VT. That had never occurred before. All that was back in 2015. The last time I rode a non E bike was December 2015. At the legends weekend Bike Park Wales. I shouldn’t have but the risk verses reward made me take that chance. So my very last proper ride was with my racing buddies from 20 years earlier. Peaty, Titley Ponting, Ashton, Hawyes, Hemming; basically all the old boys. I had to do it really. I kinda knew it would probably be my last ride. So it was special
Since then things have got progressively worse for my heart. I have had uncountable VTs that have had to be treated by my ICD. Sometimes just over pacing is enough to sort me out but far too often a full defib shock is needed.
That’s quite hard to deal with. I guess the worse is when I’m out of rhythm and can feel my ICD trying to get me back with over pacing “passive treatment” knowing it will only have four attempts at that before a full on shock.You know things are bad when you wake from a falling dream and go into a VT that needs a full on defib shock to bring you back into sinus rhythm
While all that is a bit of a bummer. Whats actually worse for my quality of life is, I have other rhythm issues; bouts of ectopic activity and AF. These are less life threatening than my VTs but so debilitating, frightening and stressful since they are a pre cursor to my heart dropping into a full VT. My usual day now will consist of at least two hours of this debilitating rhythm, to the point im laid on the sofa . I’m having more of these episodes later in the day to so. At least five nights out of seven a week I’m in bed and exhausted by 8pm. The doctors say I need to reduce work load or quit all together. Reduce stress. Reduce day length . Reduce fun. Don’t get to hot, don’t get to cold, don’t go too high “altitude”. I feel is if I have no life. The problem is I would go insane if I did not do my job. This is why Fatcreations has grown so fast its all I can really do with my life. Everything else that gave me any feeling of self worth and importance has been taken away from me. So I work seven days a week. People say take a day off and go and do something. But they don’t understand. DO WHAT? Do what I cant. My heart is always just a beat away from making me feel ill, unwell, incapacitated. If I have had a few good days in a row I could manage a walk with Bex and the boys and dog down the beach. But only If it’s low tide and I can walk on the sand. Even on a good day – a very best day – I could not risk a walk on the stones the exertion would tip my heart into my danger zone. Above 100 BPM now is where that is at. Imagine that for a second? What could you do and keep your heart rate below 100bpm? I can tell you not very much at all.
I’d give anything to go back to the safe 170bpm I had after the second operation. In fact I’d give almost anything to have a safe 140bpm. At least I could walk on the stones or ride unassisted on a flat road, and not have to lay down loads while my heart decides how much to punish me that day. I guess the worse thing for me is the feeling that’s never going to change. That it’s just downhill for me now and not the kind of downhill I love. I know it could always be worse and I hate sounding like a ungrateful moaning git. But I cant help how I feel.
LOOKING GRUMPY, FEELING HAPPY
Effecting Others
Probably one of the hardest thing is the feeling of hopelessness when it comes to my family my loved ones and the people in my life I really care about. I have really really let them all down. I used to be fun, funny outgoing adventurous brave and exciting. I would go out see my friends spend time with people close to me. Take Bex and the boys to the mountains summer and winter bikes and skis or boards, Help my friends with anything from riding advice to fixing their car. I can do nothing like that any more. I’m none of those things anymore. They have all lost one friend they could always rely on. But I have lost the feeling of being that reliable person to all my friends and love ones. The last time i ventured out to the cinema (I used to go lots) I had to leave the guys 20 minutes into the film as the adrenalin and bass from the film “Dunkirk” set my heart out of rhythm. I had to go lay in my car in the carpark and force them to stay put saying I was just a little bumpy; thats what i call it. You know, keep it light hearted, I can’t even watch a war film with the family without my heart ruining it. I hate to admit it but I am practically a hermit. I can count the times I have left the surrounds of my home in the last four months on my fingers.
WITH BEST FRIEND DARREN AND THE BOYS HAVING FUN IN THE MOUNTAINS
I can’t laugh too much, can’t argue, can’t get angry, upset or scared as that releases adrenalin which causes really quite serious issues for me and can leave me unwell for the rest of the day or longer or even cause hospital visits. I have to lead a very monotone life – not too happy not too sad, just plod along. I could never really describe how hard it is at times to stay smiley on the outside, when on the inside you are torn to shreds.
Lucky
I’m so so lucky I have Fatcreations – it would not be possible to work for anyone else. Being unwell so often and never knowing when I can do a full day’s work would make that impossible. So the infinite flexibility Fatcreations gives me is a life saver. The satisfaction I get gives me a lift. All your love, likes and comments are a lifeline for my mental state. You can never ever know how important you all are to my wellbeing, I can’t thank you all enough.
I really should stop now. I just want to say if I forget to reply to a message or email or even if I seem short or low I really don’t mean to. Sometimes things get a bit much. And some days are harder than others,
I will say I’m grateful I’m still here, so many with my condition are not so lucky,
From the bottom of broken heart i must thank you guys so much for your support.
Go do a hard ride for me.
Ali
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