Survivor Wants To Sustain ‘Go Red’ Message Year-Round

By John Voket

On a warm summer morning in August 2004, 40-year-old Newtown resident Jennifer Sposta was getting ready to make a trip to Massachusetts to see her son pitch in the nine-year-old New England Regional Championship Baseball game. One moment she was standing beside her husband and the next thing she remembered was being loaded into a waiting ambulance.

Ms Sposta had suffered a brain attack, also more commonly referred to as a stroke.

In the ensuing year-and-a-half since that fateful day, Ms Sposta worked hard, undergoing rehabilitation sessions sometimes three times each week. Although she and her family were forced to undergo the challenges presented by limited insurance coverage that ran out just two weeks into her rehab regimen, and the loss of her job after being unable to return after 12 weeks of short-term leave, she is upbeat.

February is American Heart Month and women across the country are “going red” throughout February to bring attention to cardiovascular disease as the nation’s top killer of women. This week, this energetic mother and Newtown neighbor is among the thousands of stroke and heart attack survivors contributing their voices in celebration of “Go Red for Women.”

Ms Sposta was recently recognized as an official survivor ambassador and spokeswoman for the American Heart Association’s Go Red For Women movement. Thanks to her advocacy for the organization and her outreach to women across the state, she is being honored at the American Heart Association Inaugural Connecticut Go Red For Women Luncheon, to be held on February 3 at the Hartford Golf Club.

“How can I not participate in the prevention of this disease when a stroke took me by surprise, with no symptoms to attach to it,” she wrote in a testimonial submitted to the American Heart Association (AHA). “I could be looking at another one down the road and not know when, how bad or where.”

Go Red For Women is a nationwide movement initiated by the AHA to empower women to love — and save — their hearts through lifestyle choices and actions. National Wear Red Day for Women, February 3, has its own dress code.

On this day, the AHA is encouraging all its supporters to “Go Red” in their own fashion. Wearing red clothes or accessory like a red blouse, a red dress, red pin, red lipstick, even carrying a fabulous red handbag or sporting a red tie and red socks helps promote support for heart disease prevention.

According to the AHA, too few people realize that heart disease is the number one killer of women and men. But the good news is, heart disease can be prevented.

Spreading the Go Red For Women message — “Love your heart” — raises awareness of heart disease and empowers women to reduce their risk.

By encouraging co-workers and friends to wear red on Wear Red Day, individuals can help introduce those they work beside or care about to information they need to protect themselves and their loved ones.

Besides the support and information she received and promotes through the local AHA chapter, Ms Sposta also credits several other local organizations for helping her and her family get through the long, tough period since her brain attack.

“I have had nightmare battles with my disability insurer, but now things have settled down a bit with the help of the Connecticut Department of Rehab Services,” she said.

Not only did the DRS pay for Ms Sposta’s physical rehabilitation sessions, the office is also helping the local stroke survivor get back on her feet financially by underwriting the necessary classes she requires to get a paralegal certificate.

“I feel certain that I would still be in a wheelchair today without the support of Danbury Hospital’s Main Street Rehab, and the Connecticut Department of Rehab Services,” she said. “Without their staff and physical, emotional, and financial support, I’d be fully disabled instead of 90 percent rehabilitated.”

To help give back to the efforts that have brought her such a great distance since her own stroke, Ms Sposta recently held a small fundraiser gathering with friends in her home to raise funds. And of course, all the guests wore red!

As her friends and Newtown neighbors go about their business this Friday, she hopes that they will take a moment to recognize both the dangers of heart disease and stroke, and to learn more about heart healthy prevention by contacting and supporting the efforts of the American Heart Association.

“I am just one voice of many out there who need your help,” she said.

For free materials, women’s programs, a red dress pin, or information about the Go Red For Women movement, call the American Heart Association at 888-MY-HEART.