Upbeat CHD Thriver, Author and Motivational Speaker, Beth Greenaway!

Beth Greenaway has an amazing story to share with Anna in this brand new episode of Heart to Heart with Anna. Beth helps Anna kick off Season 14 of this podcast for the CHD community by sharing her CHD journey and how she most recently came to deal with a number of harrowing experiences.

As you can see by the cover photo, Beth Greenaway is a published author. She shares with Anna how she came to write a book and how it can help people, not only in the congenital heart defect (CHD) community but in other communities where they might face medical adversity.

Join us today, or at your convenience, to hear this motivational, exceptional CHD Thriver, Author and, dare we say, Philosopher?!

To purchase Beth's book, use this link: https://tinyurl.com/y4qwq76w

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Transcript

Anna Jarowski: 0:00

I wanted something useful, something really, truly positive to come out of that not such good experience. It could have gone one of two different ways, but I really wanted to leave a legacy from that.

Interlude Music: 0:20

[Intro music]

Anna Jarowski: 0:20

Welcome to heart to heart with Anna. I am Anna Jaworski and the host of your program. We are in season 14 and we're happy you are here with us today. I'd like to give a shout out to some recent hearts unite the globe donors. Special thanks to Annie Ulchak, Laura Schleicher Laura Bradford, Frank Jaworski for their recent support. Did you know that you can give to hug, the nonprofit that funds this podcast? If you go to our website, Hearts Unite the globe.org there's a donate button on the bottom of every page. Please consider making a donation to help us with the cost of programming so we can continue to make this program and new programs for the CHD community in the future. I am so excited about today's show to feature a special author. Today's show is entitled, Upbeat CHD thriver, author and motivational speaker, Beth Greenway. Beth Greenway is a congenital heart defect thriver. She has had three open heart surgeries and complications which have affected her life, but she has risen above every circumstance. We'll learn more about her roadblocks later in the show. Like many heart warriors, Beth is an independent and successful achiever. She runs her own fitness business working mostly with those who have longterm health conditions such as heart disease, cancer and stroke. I first came to know Beth thanks to a Facebook group called cardiac athletes, so it's no surprise that Beth is a keen athlete and outdoor enthusiast who enjoys cycling, sailing, kayaking, and pretty much any activity which involves moving her body. We'll, learn about how her recent health challenges have affected her In the second segment of the program. We'll also be learning about Beth's support group community, upbeat warrior, which is a group for those living with significant longterm health conditions and her most recent plunge into the discipline of public speaking. Beth Greenway was also a guest on heart to heart with Anna during our cardiac athletes series. So welcome back to heart to heart with Anna, Beth.

Beth Greenaway: 2:18

Hello Anna. It's an absolute delight to be here. It was 18 months ago. I last had the opportunity to talk to you and it's a real honor to have to get that chance again today and to chat with you and spread some good news to your audience.

Anna Jarowski: 2:31

Well, there is a lot of good news. Let's start by having you tell us about what heart to fight you were born with and what surgeries you've had.

Beth Greenaway: 2:40

I was born in 1972. I'm always slightly taken aback when I say that because I think, gosh, was it that long ago, but yes, it was. I had a diagnosis fairly shortly after I was born of pulmonary stenosis stenosis and an atrial septal defect. I went on to have surgery, I suppose in some terms, relatively late. Many people have surgery as a young child, but I was nine and a half, so that was in 1981 and I had, I think they called it a pulmonary valvotomy, which always sounds very grand. They tinkered with my pulmonary valve and tried to make it slightly more blood tight and the hole in my heart, the ASD was closed and I had very good health and for quite a considerable amount of time. It wasn't really until the early two thousands that things started to get a bit more interesting and I had arrhythmia issues and that sort of came to my attention. That may be all was not well. I'd almost discharged myself from followup once I'd had that surgery when I was younger and I thought, well, that was it. I was cured and go off and be married. So things came back to bite me a little into thousands. So I ended up in 2005 I had a pulmonary valve replacement. Again, very successful and bounce back fairly effectively again. Then things were stable until 2016 and 2017. Unfortunately, I had a stroke in 2016 and then in 2017 I got the dreaded endocarditis that you read about, but you don't think it'll happen to you. Unfortunately it did. And that involved another emergency surgery and another pulmonary valve replacement many months in hospital. That's, I'm still here to laugh about it and tell the tale.

Anna Jarowski: 4:13

Wow. That's quite a whirlwind though. So it sounds like even though your parents found out when you were very young that you had a congenital heart defect, they weren't worried about immediate surgery like with some children. So was your early childhood very active as it very normal?

Beth Greenaway: 4:31

I mean, it's hard because I obviously can't remember particularly well my very early childhood, but my sort of thoughts or always was that I would class myself as a bit of a sickly child. I seem to recollect catching every bug, germ, and an ything e lse that was going around. I had it, and I seem to get a lot of chest in fections a nd certainly had some time off school. But actually what I've always admired my pa rents f o r r eally deeply was the fact that al though t hey must have known they had a child who had what was going to be a l ongterm health condition th at d idn't wrapped me in cotton wool. They were always incredibly encouraging and incredibly nurturing. They didn't, I don't think, treat me any different than they would an otherwise healthy ch ill. N ow I don't have any siblings, so maybe I was the only person they had to focus on. So they had no comparison. But I felt incredibly blessed throughout my life that they didn't treat me as if I was different and they encourage me to do anything that I wanted to. But I think the lovely thing about being a child with a health condition is that you sort of set your own limits and they seem to have the confidence to allow me to do that, which I'm not a parent either, but I don't know how they did that because you must constantly want to be thinking, oh no, no, no, don't do that. That might not go well. But actually everyone has to explore their own limits and find out what their boundaries are. And I was very lucky that they encouraged me to go walking with them and to do all sorts of activities. I know I was slower uncertainly as it approached my surgery. I can remember not being well and having a friend's father actually carry me on his shoulders. That shows how small I was at that point. Even as a nine and a half year old, I was still sort of baby sized and he stuck me on his shoulders to go for a walk. Cause obviously I couldn't walk very far. But just because of the way my parents treated me, my perceptions, I didn't particularly view myself as someone who was horribly unwell and I'm actually grateful for that.

Anna Jarowski: 6:20

Sure. Yeah. I think that probably has a lot to do with how you consider yourself a thriver now and how you're able to stay so upbeat despite the fact that you've had multiple surgeries. I've heard people say, and it's interesting because Mother's Day just passed recently, and I got something in the mail that said something about, nobody said it was going to be easy to be a mother, but the good mothers are the ones who rise above the struggle. So now I think that's true for any person, whether you're a mother or a thriver like you are.

Beth Greenaway: 6:52

Absolutely.

Anna Jarowski: 6:53

And you are a thriver because you even had a stroke at one point in your life. Now you were an adult when you had the stroke. Tell us about the consequences of having the stroke. That must have been so scary. It's interesting. That was early 2016 so if I look at my, call it a journey. If I look at my medical journey, it's actually the only part of it, which if you could, I'd say, if you could rewind and do things differently. It's the only part of my story that I'd actually like to delete and move on without it. But of course life doesn't go that way. I was very active and I'd been to a regular indoor cycling, spinning class in the morning of the stroke. Nothing particularly untoward, no more arrhythmia problems than I'd had before. Now I had got very used to exercising with arrhythmia issues. I was anti-coagulated, so it was always told no, that was fine. We can't do much about the arrhythmia problem, but you'll be all right. It won't cause you any significant problems. And I'd sort of gone on merrily with that sort of illusion I suppose, or maybe delusion.

Beth Greenaway: 7:55

So I, I'd gone to the class. In fact, I left the class, had a shower, and I'd gone to the supermarket on the way home and it wasn't until I got there that I was looking at something in the aisle and I thought to myself, there's something really weird about my eye and it hadn't dawned on me til then and I thought, hang on. Then there's a black bit at the bottom. Oh dear. Yeah. That doesn't seem quite right. But being the normal sort of get on with life and don't worry about these things, everything sorts itself out kind of person that I am. I dismissed it and went, ah, well that'll be fine in a few days. Unfortunately it kind of kept grabbing. It took me a few days to go to the eye hospital. I'm honest, and I went, nope, hang on, this isn't right. A friend of mine actually said, I think you should go and get that checked out. And I went, okay, on and off I went. And it was one of those bizarre moments where I met a doctor in his room and he said, well, we don't think you've had a stroke. We're not exactly sure what's going on, but we'll get you a brain MRI to see and in the meantime change your anticoagulants and increased them slightly, et cetera. And, and off I went and unfortunately there's no point of portioning blame and it might not have changed the outcome, but the MRI referral somehow in the hospital got lost. Oh my goodness. It was about two weeks later when I sort of called again and went, Huh, I think maybe I should have had an MRI. And they went, oh, it's in the routine pile. It's all good. And I went, no I'm not sure about this. Lo and behold, somebody obviously hurried somebody along because a few hours later I got a phone call from the Stroke Unit. Saying, we have an urgent MRI referral for you here. I went, well, no, that was three weeks ago. So anyway, long story short, I got a brain MRI and with them having decided previous,"No, no, you're fine. You haven't had a stroke." They took one look at the MRI and said, oh good grief. Not only i f you had a stroke, but it appears there is historical stroke as well. Maybe that happened from my earlier surgery, who knows. But uh, unfortunately the blackness ki nd o f k ept on creeping and kept on cr eeping a n d c e rtainly b ecause of that three week timeframe I re ally h ave no usable vision in the left eye now. It does see a small amount. It has a very small visual field. It's not useful vision. So I think my brain just disregards it now. So that's inconvenient. I would say I've got good vision in my other eye, but I have issues with depth perception and how far away things are. I don't like driving, especially not at night. I have managed to retain my dr iver's l icense as long as my good ey e i s a good eye, but I don't like moving from light to dark. It takes a while for everything to adjust. And obviously I have no peripheral vision at all on one side. So I'm very nervous about people walking into me, driving into me, k nocking into me. In the scheme of things. If this is the worst thing I have to bear, then it is what it is.

Interlude Music: 10:44

(Violin playing music)

Home2night4ever: 10:51

Home. Tonight. Forever by the Baby Blue Sound Collective, I think what I love so much about this CD is that some of the songs were inspired by the patients. Many listeners will understand many of the different songs and what they've been inspired by. Our new album will be available on iTunes, Amazon.com, Spotify. I love the fact that the proceeds from this CD are actually going to help those with congenital heart defects. Enjoy the music. Home. Tonight. Forever.

H2HwMichael: 11:26

"Texas Heart Institute were offering us a mechanical heart and he said,"No, Dad, I've had enough. Give it to someone who's worthy."""My father promised me a golden dress to twirl in. He held my hand and asked me where I wanted to go.""Whatever strife or conflict that we experienced in our long career together was always healed by." Heart to Heart with Michael... please join us every Thursday at noon Eastern as we talk with people from around the world who have experienced those most difficult moments.

Rejoiner: 11:47

You are listening to Heart to Heart with Anna. If you have a question or comment that you would like addressed on our show, please send an email to Anna Jaworski at Anna@HearttoHeartwithAnna.com. That's Anna@HearttoHeartwithAnna.com. Now back to Heart to Heart with Anna.

Anna Jarowski: 12:17

Before the break we were talking about your congenital heart defect and your stroke, Beth. In this segment, I'd really like to talk to you about your most recent complication that affected you in the spring of 2017. So why don't you tell us about what happened to you then.

Beth Greenaway: 12:33

Yes, it was unfortunately literally a year off the stroke and I hadn't been very well for probably about a month. It started with a kidney infection, which was treated with antibiotics and I thought again that was, that. Unfortunately I had some concurrent gynecological issues related to my monthly period and the blood thinners I was on was causing issues there and it's sort of all sort of became a bit of a blur. And I'm honest enough to say that I don't think maybe I was as proactive as I should have been. I had several emergency room admissions with bleeding and feeling very dizzy. And in that process they discovered I was extremely anemic, which somewhat made sense. I needed a blood transfusion and in the process of that actually occurring, they decided that they couldn't give it to me cause I had a bit of a temperature, which should have been a bit of a warning sign, but they said, oh no, well we're not sure what's going on.

Anna Jarowski: 13:26

Go Away and come back in a few days' time. And I really was in a bit of a state at this point. If I look back, I go, gosh, that really should have had warning bells going off in my own head. But I just assumed I'm anemic. You know, once I've got this blood, I'll be feeling much better. Unfortunately, a few days later I got a phone call from my cardiologist who said, you need to get to the hospital and you need to get to the hospital now. We tested some blood from a few nights ago and we think you have endocarditis. And unfortunately as soon as they said it, I thought, oh you fool. Of course you have. It's like I said the, the bleeding and the other stuff, which just kind of blurred my mind and maybe just proportionate then I thought, oh no, you silly fool. Ah, again, it is what it is. You can't rewind in life. You can button go forwards. And I was in fact very lucky, I was at my local hospital at that point and they took one look at me and spoke to my consultant who's 120 miles away and he said she needs to get here. So I had a very lovely 120 mile blue light ambulance ride. Oh Wow. Up the highway to get there. And a few days later I was on the operating room table having another valve replacements and having all this infected matter should we say cleaned up. It wasn't the way I would have liked it to have gone down and the button again you can, but take the positives out of it. Say I survive that nasty situation. I spent two months in the hospital with IV antibiotics and and all sorts of other things to try and sort of sorted it out again, full circle. I'm, I feel much better. I've got horrible rhythm problems still at another things that probably wouldn't have occurred had that situation not, but I'm still here to laugh about it. So laughter is the medicine for me and one game. Here you go. Wow. It sounds like things were snowball like on you with kidney infection and female problems then. Yeah. Wow. I mean just one thing after another and so it's no wonder you kind of missed it because you are probably just trying to put one step in front of the other. Oh, it was in an awful state. I will say I hadn't actually gone upstairs in my house for about a week. Oh Wow. Goes, I was so dizzy. I actually couldn't get up the stairs so I was sleeping on the sofa downstairs because I did. You've already figured out that going upstairs wasn't a good plan. Right? Well because falling down the stairs would not be okay. Wouldn't have been pretty right. Oh my gosh. Well keeping a woman like you down in the hospital I'm sure was no easy task. So what did you do while you were in the hospital for such a long time? I really very early on sort of aside from getting over for the surgery and to be honest that only took a few weeks and obviously I was getting all these antibiotics. I started to actually feel quite a lot better I suppose in comparison to where I had been. It's no surprise that actually anything was an improvement and I quickly figured out that since I knew I was going to be stuck there for quite some time, the answer was to build a routine. Well and I suppose hospital has a routine, but I wanted my own routine cause I wanted to, it sounds old, but I wanted to grab that opportunity and that gift at the time when else in life was only going to get to basically be taken care of. I didn't have to cook, clean, make my bed or do anything else that I really didn't want to do, pay the bill. It was all taken care of. So I thought this is the most incredible sort of opportunity in luxury. So I built my routine. I made sure I got up and I went to bed at the same time every day. I always made a plan if I could to get dressed, don't lie around in bed or in your dressing gown, get up and do the things you would do otherwise I still to do a little walking plan. I was not allowed far from the hospital, but I figured out I could go out and walk around the perimeter and come back in again. I did that three times a day after breakfast, after lunch and after the evening meal I did some online courses. Again, I discovered this. You get lovely online courses these days and I'd always thought, oh, well, I'll do some of them when I've got time. Well, what I had this point was time. So I used it. I started documenting my day, and indeed I started writing my book. It all kind of rolled into the same process. I thought, what if I'm documenting this I, I'm going to keep putting my ideas down and putting my tips and things. As I had that experience, I shared my learning because I thought, well, at some point this might actually be to someone else facing a similar or sort of slightly different adversity[inaudible] so tell us about how people can find your Amazon bestselling book, upbeat, growing resilience and positivity in the face of medical adversity. The really lovely thing is I managed to find fairly early on in my writing process, a publisher who was prepared to actually take this on and helped me with the process. So that meant it actually got done. My fear in these things is the doors that I were to spend a lot of effort on them. A bit of a perfectionist and I'd have just let it go and wouldn't have been happy with it and would never have done it. So the fact I had a publisher managed to get it onto Amazon and I was very lucky that it became a best seller in its category on the day it launched. Its since slid quite considerably. But that really helped to sort of push it along. And I spent some time obviously with social media posts and I was so shocked really that it did as well as it did. I was kind of expecting about five people in the whole world to read it. It turns out there's a few more than that. And the fact the audience is still growing, I still speak to people is, it's almost a year later now and I still speak to people who, uh, who say they found it and they've seen it and, and so, yeah, you can get it on Amazon internationally. It doesn't matter. So what part of the world your entity should be available? And I have links on my website so that people can find it. And, and again, I do as many talks and things as I can to try and spread the word that it's out there. Definitely be talking about that more in the next segment, but I find it fascinating that while you were recuperating here, you were writing a book that just blows my mind. I am so impressed that that was what you decided to put a lot of your time and attention in. I wanted something useful, something really, truly positive to come out of that not such good experience. It could have gone one of two different ways, but I really wanted to leave a legacy from that.

Speaker 5: 19:47

Hi, my name is Jamie Alk Ros and I just published my new book, the Tin Man Diaries. It's an amazing story of my sudden change of heart as I went through a heart liver transplant. I can think of no better way to read the tin man diaries in the cuddle up in your favorite hearts, unite to globe sweatshirt and your favorite hot beverage. Of course in your hearts United Globe Mug, both of which are available at the hug podcast, network, online store, or visit hearts unite to globe.at Wharton.

Speaker 4: 20:20

If you've enjoyed listening to this program, please visit our website hearts unite to globe.org and make a contribution. This program is a presentation of hearts unite the globe and as part of the hug podcast network or tonight, the globe is a nonprofit organization devoted to providing resources to the congenital heart defect community to educate, empower, and enrich the lives of our community members. If you would like access to free resources pertaining to the CHC community, please visit our website@congenitalheartdefects.com for information about Chd, hospitals that treat CHD survivors summer camps for Chd families and much, much more[inaudible].

Anna Jarowski: 21:08

It's an author myself. I know that writing a book is no easy task, but the writing part is the easiest part. It's the marketing part that is so hard. Tell me what you're doing now to keep people talking about your book. Yes. I'm not what you might call photogenic or video Janick I don't know. Again, I did get myself out there. People had assured me that the way to just sort of market about that, you're right. The writing part with was simple. I literally, we managed to write that book in in about six weeks. The editing process took another few months, but then it was down to me really. The publisher had done some sort of help to sort of give me some ideas, but you sort of get launched with a booker and left it to sort of push it along on your own. Yet social media was a key for me because it enabled me to reach a much wider audience. But we social media, you've can't just do one post, you've got to post frequently and you've got to sort of really be open and honest and consistent. I found that a struggle and I suppose I'm still trying to sort of work on that process because it's no good to build an audience and then go quiet because the audience then all disappears, so you have to keep posting. So I have a Facebook page and my page, which is Beth j, green away as a j in the middle because that's very important because otherwise it goes to somebody else. Huh. So Beth j green. No, I, and, and again, I'm still trying to post videos and they're all full and I've just accepted that they're awful. But like so many things in life, the more you do something, the slightly better you get. It's never going to be my forte again. I keep trying to sort of JV myself along and remind myself that the goal of this is to impact as many people as I can. So in doing that, so I've got to be prepared to put myself out there. It's not going to do it on its own. So again, and it's talking to people and making connections and that's what I've sort of become determined to do. And so you've started this support community called upbeat warrior. Talk to us about that. Yes, that was a sideline I realized quite early on. I mean, I've been on Facebook now as a, as a sort of a personal person for I pretty much since it started. And the support that's available online that was remarkable. You can reach out and in contact people all over the world. It's such a small world we live in because we have access to it, to people anywhere. But I realized there was a lot of very cardiac specific or even conditions specific groups out there. But there was none really that I could find for people with multiple conditions or different conditions. And I've learned that it's okay to talk to people with your condition, but actually what really de stigmatizes things to realize that we're all somewhat in this together and people with other conditions, we all suffer and we all have traumas to overcome. And it's empowering and enlightening to hear other people's stories and people with entirely different conditions and learn how they cope and the challenges they face that that brings an incredible perspective to have our own suffering really. So I wanted to connect people with a whole sort of slew of different health conditions so that we can support and, and learn from each other. I love that because you're so right. I think everybody has a story and I think we can all learn to be more upbeat when we hear other things that people have overcome. So you have shared some of the most amazing experiences in your life, but now I understand that you're starting a career as a motivational speaker. So tell us a little bit more about that. Yeah, the, the term career actually sounds role to grand there, but uh, yes, I'll take it again. That desire to spread my message of hope and positivity where when facing adversity in general, it seemed like I, I had a message that it was important to share. I don't know what my, my legacy in life is going to be. As I've said, I don't unfortunately have children, so they won't be that. So I want my life to count for something. Again, that sounds weird. It all the more posh than it should, but I want to leave something behind when I'm gone. And I realized that the way to for me to do that because of my experience is to, is to share that with as wide an audience as I can and to reach as many people as possible. So I thought what people do at that point is, is they, they try and become a bit of a, uh, a motivational speaker. And I've been speaking to a smaller audiences over the last few years anyway as part of my work. And I've decided to sort of hone that a little more. And I've signed up, in fact, I think it may have been your advice. I'm just about to join a toastmasters so I can, uh, so that I can work on my technique because that is definitely a need. Somebody needs some work and I'm, I've got a number of opportunities to speak lined up later this year to a couple of conferences and indeed one of my own events. It's something that I feel very passionate about. I need to use my experiences to help other people. My experiences are just mine. If I don't tell people, yes, I'm so happy you're toast masters. I've been a member of toastmasters for over 18 years now and my toastmasters helped me so much. I mean if it wasn't for my toastmaster friends, I don't think I would've had the confidence to do this podcast. No. I've realized in life one of the most amazing gifts I've had is the ability to work with people and indeed organizations that have filled in the gaps. I realize sometimes where I'm deficient and the way to deal with that is, is to work with other people or other organizations that can sort of nurture and an accelerate the learning. I can figure all these things out on my own. It just takes too long. I don't have that long. I want to accelerate that process and learn from the best. Well, and then the other thing too is once again, you're part of a community. You're part of a community of people who believe in self improvement and they want to help foster that in you as well. And I find that when I've surrounded myself with other likeminded people, it is so uplifting for me and I love to help other people, so I stay in toastmasters now as much to help myself. Yes, that's important, but I stay in it even more so because I love watching new people who joined and I can help mentor them to be the people that I see they're going to be, which is really, really amazing. Yup. You sound like you have that in you too. You're going to join and before you know what you're going to be helping a lot of other people, but in helping those people, you help yourself. That's one of the most amazing things in life I've learned in my whole career is that actually the more I help others, the more that comes back in spades. It's something that it's a good thing to figure out early in life because then the whole path is a lot smoother. Oh yeah, absolutely. I want people to find your book now. Is your book and Ebook or is it a printed book? Beth? It will come out of the way. There is indeed a soft back version that you can buy from Amazon or you can actually get a downloadable kindle, so however you wish to digest the content, it is available. Okay. And that's upbeat, growing resilience and positivity in the face of medical adversity. Find it on Amazon and as I'm sure a lot have you noticed with her lovely jargon and her lovely accent. She is not from the USA. She's speaking to me from the United Kingdom. You can still buy her book. I imagine if you're in the United States, you can still get that from Amazon as well. You can, yeah, it comes on amazon.com you can buy it. In fact, somebody contacted me a couple of days ago and said they had just bought a copy so I can verify the fact that it is available. That is awesome. Thank you so much for coming on the program today, Beth, and for sharing so much with us about your book and your support group and public speaking. I have a feeling you and I are gonna meet each other at a conference some day and maybe it will be on the same panel discussion and that'd be awesome. I think that would be absolutely incredible. It would be a complete thrill to meet it, to actually get the opportunity to meet you in person breathing your rarefied air. Be just something I would be thrilled by. Oh, you're so funny. I just love you. Bet. Well, friends, that does conclude this episode of heart to heart with Anna. Thanks for listening today. Find us on our website hearts tonight, the globe.org I remember my friends, you are not alone.

Speaker 6: 29:17

Thank you again for joining us this week. We hope you have been inspired and empowered to become an advocate for the congenital heart defect community, heart to heart with Anna, with your hose damage. Jaworski can be heard every Tuesday at 12 noon eastern time.

Interlude Music: 29:37

[inaudible].