You don’t always have to buy a ticket to win the lotto, just ask Aaron Morris.

The building industry stalwart who is best known as the Group Head of Sales for the Stoddart Group was walking around the Sunshine Coast without a worry in the world last December, looking forward to his only daughter’s wedding in April.

What he didn’t realise was he had a ticking time bomb in his chest and if nothing had changed the chances are Aaron would have had a massive heart attack within six months.

But sometimes we need a little luck, and on that day it came to Aaron in the form of a phone call from a close relative who told him he’d just had a couple of stents put in after failing his yearly stress test.

“I guess it gave me the kick up the bum to go geez, you know I’m two years older than him, I should go and get checked, so I went and made an appointment with my GP.”

His doctor was so concerned with the test results he booked Aaron into a cardiologist, who in another stroke of luck was able to see him within days not weeks.

“I went to the cardiologist,” Aaron said, “who looked at the markers.” 

“He didn’t want me to leave without a CT scan, and then he checked with the guy who does them and by another small miracle there just happened to be an opening.

“The cardiologist gets the results and asks me to sit back down with him. We take a look at them, and he says, mate you’re coming in tomorrow morning.” 

Twenty-four-hours later the cardiologist inserted a stent to open a nearly fully blocked artery in Aaron’s chest – and the 53-year-old walked out of the hospital feeling like a new man.

Aaron’s is one of the lucky ones.

Heart disease kills one Australian every 18 minutes, about 79 persons dying of heart disease every day. 

This accounts for nearly one in five of all deaths in Australia, with more males dying of heart disease than females, each year. 

Someone is hospitalised for heart disease every 80 seconds, more than a thousand Australians a day.

And 46 per cent more men than women are hospitalised due to heart disease.

Aaron was reluctant to tell this story, but said if it inspired one person in the building industry to get tested it would be worth it.

“I guess on reflection in the building industry mate it’s always job first, family second, health last,” he said.

“You’ve got nothing without your health, I mean men in particular have to be more vigilant, talk more and just get check-ups.

“We don’t talk about our mental health or health in general, we don’t go and see the doctor unless our bloody eyes are bleeding. 

“Just take 10 minutes out of one day and just go and get a check up done, it could save your life.”

And there had been signs, for months Aaron had niggles – muscular pain in the back, running out of breath and tiredness. The lawn was taking twice as long to mow and he’d be shattered afterwards. 

He wrote off those symptoms to getting older – that “she’ll be right, mate” attitude could have killed him.

He now has a new life and a new attitude.

“I’m walking twice a day. I’m just focused on health now cause you know seriously without it but what have we got? We got nothing.”

He may have already won the lotto of life by getting his surgery just in time,  but the first thing he did when he walked out of that hospital after getting the stent was buy a lotto ticket. 

It lost, but all going to plan, Aaron will walk his daughter down the aisle at her wedding in April.  

Take Action

Take 10 minutes and Get Your Heart Health Check with your GP to find out your risk of heart disease and what you can do to prevent it. Have a look at your heart age online with the Heart Foundation’s calculator.

Author: Richard O'Leary

Experienced writer, commentator and political advisor, Richard held a raft of journalism and editorial roles before taking executive communication roles for multiple Premiers, Chief Ministers and even NBN Co. He grew up in his father’s construction business and joins The Good Builder as its founding Editor.