This is the first survivor story for Naeve Health Care Foundation and Albert Lea Medical Center’s newest fund-raiser, “The beat goes on.” This is a $327,000 effort to raise money for crucial, cutting-edge cardiac care equipment for area first responders and ALMC’s ambulance services, cardiology and cardiac rehab departments.

Meet Tiffany Kriesel, a 34-year-old living in Owatonna. She and her husband, Joel, have one son, Wyatt, 7. She works at Freeborn Lumber in Albert Lea, enjoys spending time with family and friends, being active and is a heart attack survivor.

“On the surface it doesn’t make sense, it shouldn’t,” she says. “It all started when I became pregnant.”

After two second-trimester miscarriages, testing showed Kriesel had antiphospholipid syndrome, a condition that causes clotting. Signs depend on where the blood clots form or travel to, but one is repeated miscarriages.

When Kriesel became pregnant for a third time she was put on blood thinners and gave herself Heparin shots. At 27 weeks she developed high blood pressure and was taken to St. Marys Hospital in Rochester.

“I had a pulmonary embolism during the C-section,” she says. “They put a filter in my neck to prevent the clot from traveling so I could deliver.”

Physicians determined her antiphospholipid syndrome was related to her pregnancies. She was put on Coumadin for six months following Wyatt’s birth, but no other medications. Six and a half healthy years later, Kriesel suffered a heart attack.

Last August, while vacationing at her parent’s cabin, she felt a pain in her back. “It just felt like I needed to crack my back,” she says. Later that day, Joel and Wyatt found her slumped by the back door.

Joel and her dad performed CPR until the Elysian first responders and Waseca ambulance arrived and used an automated external defibrillator to shock her system. They intubated her and called Mayo One to the scene.

“That AED saved my life,” she says. “If the first responders hadn’t had one, this would be a completely different story.”

Kriesel went to St. Marys Hospital, where Sandra Birchem, a cardiologist at ALMC, could be one of her providers.

“An angiocardiogram showed heart damage so the doctors determined I had a heart attack, but no one knew why,” she says. “Their best guess is a blood clot went to my heart and stopped it.”

A defibrillator was implanted for precautionary measures and one week later she was released from the hospital. Since then, Kriesel has worked to reduce her medications and resume normal life. Her defibrillator is tested quarterly.

“I’ve really felt fine since then,” she says. “I ran a 5K with my sister over Thanksgiving, I’m playing volleyball and started taking a Zumba class. The defibrillator does offer peace of mind, but I’m not letting this experience rule my life.”

For more information visit www.naevehealthcarefoundation.org. NHCF’s Gala supporting “The beat goes on” has been scheduled for Sept. 24 at Wedgewood Cove.