Drew Carey says misconceptions led him to ignore heart attack symptoms
Drew Carey said he didn’t realize he was having a heart attack during the run of his ‘90s to early 2000s hit "The Drew Carey Show" because he believed the misconception that a person is supposed to clench their heart and fall down.
"I was really overweight, and we were supposed to come back to taping," Carey told Ted Danson on his podcast, "Where Everybody Knows Your Name," Wednesday.
Carey said he decided to start jogging to lose weight before he went back to the show.
"So, I had a little chest heart monitor and whatever. And I was jogging down my street, and my heart rate went up to like 160 or something like that, like really crazy, and I was like, ‘Oh,’ And I felt like numb in my shoulder."
He said he was experiencing "all the things that I read were heart attack symptoms, but I thought if you had a heart attack, you would go ugh and fall down like in a cartoon. I thought that's what happened when you had a heart attack."
His immediate response was "Oh, that's really worrisome. Let me slow down."
The comedian’s heart slowed down to about 80 beats per minute, he said, "which is already high anyway. And then I started again, and it shot right up, and it happened a couple times."
Carey said he even crossed paths with a deer during his run, which he had heard is "supposed to be an omen about something."
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The 67-year-old decided to walk home, and he said he called his girlfriend and told her, "I had the weirdest thing. I had all these, like, heart attack-like symptoms. Really worried me," he said. "And she goes, ‘Oh, baby, is there anything you want to do and anything I can do for you?’"
He said he told her he wanted to go to Bob’s Big Boy, where he ate chili spaghetti and an iced tea.
"Yeah, after having a heart attack."
Carey promised his girlfriend he’d call the doctor in the morning.
"The next day was the first day back, and we were doing a big special, like stunt show. And so there's a bunch of people there," he continued. "And when I got there it was all, ‘Hello, hello, how was your summer? How’ve you been?’ And I didn't call the doctor, and I did rehearsal and I felt OK."
But once the rehearsal was over, he said he felt something in his chest tighten again.
"And I went, ‘Oh, I'll be right back. Let me go to my trailer," he said. "'Let me go to the trailer and call the doctor.' And I went to the trailer, and when I went to step up the stairs to my trailer, I really went like, ‘Oh boy, that was rough.’ And I got on the phone to the producer. I said, ‘Hey, you have to call the ambulance. I think I'm having a heart attack.’"
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Carey said he was so worried he called his friend Sam Simon, who developed "The Simpsons" and was also working on "The Drew Carey Show" to say goodbye before he went to the hospital.
"So, Sam came over to my trailer, and I go, 'Hey man, I don't know what's happening, but I’m on my way to the hospital,'" he said. "I just wanted to make sure I touched him before I went off because I didn't know what was going to happen."
"The Price is Right" host was in the hospital overnight, and his doctor inserted a stent during a procedure.
"I left the next day, and I was just like weak as a kitten," he recalled, adding that actor Marc Vahanian, who was also on the podcast, showed up at his house and went for a 30-minute walk with him for his first post-heart attack workout.
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"Chili spaghetti after a heart attack," he added.
Later in the podcast, Carey said that before he started to lose weight he would barely even touch a vegetable.
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"I would go to a steak place and have the steak, the bread, the loaded mashed potatoes, a couple beers and then a dessert. And whatever vegetable was there, I would just leave it there."
Vahanian also introduced Carey to the doctor he still has who helped him turn his "weight around."
"After that, I would go to a steakhouse, I'd eat the steak, the vegetables, not order a potato or not touch it, not really have the bread and I just drink water all day," he said. "Like, I don't even drink — I don't drink alcohol at all anymore. It's wild."
Now, he often eats salads for lunch, and he still thinks, "When I'm eating, like, a salad that has green beans and stuff in it, I'm like, ‘Man, 20 years ago, 25 years ago, I wouldn't have touched this.’"
Carey narrowly escaped a massive heart attack that summer in 2001 but had an artery that was 95% blocked, according to ABC News.