A portly company director who was told exercise could kill him because of his ‘ticking timebomb’ heart defied doctors’ orders and honed an enviable six-pack.
Father-of-two Amir Ali, 43, was stunned to be diagnosed with the life-threatening heart condition arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC) in October 2015, after suffering chest pains and palpitations that he had largely ignored for months.
Told ARVC, a disease of the heart muscle that causes interruptions to the normal electrical signals to the heart, could cause life threatening arrhythmia – an irregular heartbeat – and sudden death, he was advised to quit exercise.
But after piling on the pounds during the second lockdown, Amir, who lives with his wife Rehab, 35, a stay-at-home mother, and their children Zakaria, 11, and Mohammed, eight, in Ealing, West London, took drastic action, saying: “I knew my heart was a ticking time bomb. I had no idea when it would just give up.”
He added: “Then, during the second lockdown, I put on so much weight. I’d never been heavy and I knew I needed professional help.
“I went in to see a personal trainer fully expecting they’d turn me away.
“I showed them my medical reports and everything.”
So, despite his cardiologist advising him to give up exercise because elevating his heart rate could be life threatening, last July Amir hired the trainer and began working out three times a week.
He said: “After my diagnosis, I was living in fear.
“I’ve got kids, a family, a life to lead. All of that could have stopped at any second.
“Since I started training, I have lost nearly 4st, I’ve stopped having heart palpitations and my six-monthly heart check-ups have been reduced to once a year.
“My doctors are delighted by my progress and I feel much stronger and fitter.”
Before his diagnosis, Amir had been super-fit. A karate black belt, he played frequent games of football, was a gym regular and walked for miles most days.
He had no idea he was facing such danger, saying: “I thought heart palpitations were entirely normal and assumed everyone got them.
“I thought it just happened in the same way your stomach rumbled. I got them daily for years.
“When I began having left-sided chest pain, I did what I’d always done and let nature take its course. I’m not one to go to the doctor. I only did that when the pain hadn’t stopped for six months.”
Amir was then put through a series of tests that revealed scarring on his heart, which led to a diagnosis of ARVC.
His active lifestyle was ‘turned off overnight when doctors warned him to take it easy and give up on strenuous exercise.
Doctors also put him onto medication for heart failure and high blood pressure and recommended an operation to fit an implantable cardioverter defribulator (ICD), an electronic device surgically implanted near his heart to regulate any abnormal rhythms.
