Creating calm in the chaos — small habits that helped me feel a little more in control again. When you’re recovering from a heart attack, mornings can feel uncertain. You wake up, and for a few seconds, everything seems normal — until the memory rushes back. The hospital. The fear. The realisation that life has … Read more
How self-image and perception shift — and finding pride in the new you After a heart attack, it’s not just your body that changes — it’s how you see yourself. There’s that strange, quiet moment when you catch your reflection and something feels off. The man staring back doesn’t quite look like the one you … Read more
When you’ve worked hard all your life, rest doesn’t come easy. After a heart attack, everyone tells you to slow down — but if you’ve spent decades measuring yourself by what you do, stopping feels like failure. That’s exactly how it felt for me. Rest didn’t feel like recovery — it felt wrong, uncomfortable, almost … Read more
October 21, 2025 by Dougie Smith When you have a heart attack, everything stops — except the world around you. The bills still come, the responsibilities still call, and suddenly you’re asking yourself: “What about my work? My income? My identity?” For me, that question hit hard. I was self-employed, running my own small forestry … Read more
October 14, 2025 • by Dougie Smith When you’re in the middle of a heart attack, you’d think your first thought would be about survival — but for many of us, it isn’t.It’s about the people we love. In this new episode of Stronger After the Storm, I ask the question that hit me the … Read more
October 7, 2025 — by Dougie Smith When you come home from the hospital, you expect life to go back to normal. But it doesn’t — not really. The mates, the banter, the routines — they all shift. You’ve changed, and that’s hard for others to understand. In this week’s episode of Stronger After the … Read more
When the hospital doors close behind you, life doesn’t snap back to normal. For many men, the hardest part begins when the visitors stop coming, the messages slow down, and you’re left alone with the quiet. In this episode of Stronger After the Storm, I share how silence, once peaceful, turned into a heavy weight … Read more
Surviving a heart attack isn’t just about your body healing. For many men, the bigger struggle is with identity, masculinity, and self-worth. When I came home from the hospital, I thought life would slowly return to “normal.” But inside, I couldn’t shake the question: Am I still the man I was before my heart attack? … Read more
You’ve made it out of the hospital — but sometimes that’s when the real storm begins. For many men, the hardest part of a heart attack isn’t the hospital stay, the surgery, or the rehab. It’s what comes after: the long nights, the racing thoughts, and the silent question — “Will it happen again?” In … Read more