Sabrina Cuddy • October 9, 2024
It’s Emotional Wellness October!

Treating the whole person is essential because your mind, emotional state, and physical symptoms interact. One example is that you can increase an arrhythmia by becoming anxious when it happens. It’s natural to be anxious when your heart does something unusual, but through slow breathing, relaxation, and other coping techniques, you can help yourself feel better. You can balance your emotional state by learning when you must pay attention to your symptoms and when you can safely ignore them. The  HCMA  and your medical team can help you learn how your body works with HCM.

If you’re struggling with the emotional aspects of HCM, we want to help! Here are some of our resources:

We offer  Emotional Support Discussion Groups  via Zoom. These sessions are a great place to learn coping skills, talk about your feelings, and meet your peers so you know you aren’t alone! You can find groups on our calendar for many topics in HCM that can help you feel better.

From our Big Hearted Warriors Tour, the 3/10/22 webinar with  Ascension St. Thomas Heart , there is a segment by Dr. Ronald Salomon titled “Coping with HCM – Building Resilience.” Dr. Salomon is a psychiatrist working with the HCM Center of Excellence, which gives him a unique understanding of those living with HCM. This talk starts at 1 hour, 26 minutes into the video.

If you aren’t already in our  Facebook private group , consider joining! Simply request to join the group and answer all 4 questions. Only those with HCM or close family are allowed to join, so you can hear from others living with HCM and get support from them.

If you need more emotional health care, don’t be embarrassed to talk to a therapist. It isn’t a weakness that you need a specialist for your heart, and it isn’t weak to find a specialist for your mind! Ask your cardiac care team if they can recommend a mental health therapist specializing in HCM or chronic illness. Your health insurance may have lists of therapists in your area as well. It might take trying several therapists to find one that clicks with you – that will make a difference in how much they can help you!

HCMA Blog

August's Topic is Newly Diagnosed

By Sabrina Cuddy • August 1, 2025
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Call to ACTION! Urge Congress to Invest in Medicaid and Medicare! No Cuts to these crucial programs!

By Julie Russo • July 31, 2025
Sixty years ago, Medicaid and Medicare were established when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Social Security Amendments into law. The programs were a larger part of Johnson's "War on Poverty" agenda to combat inequality. Sixty years later, Medicaid and Medicare are under attack in ways that we could never have imagined. With the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), $1 trillion was cut from Medicaid and Medicare―the largest health care cut in U.S. history. As a result of the budget package, more than 15 million people will lose health insurance, hundreds of rural hospitals will close, and approximately 51,000 people will die preventable deaths each year. Congress voted for this harm, and Congress can fix it. We need them to invest in Medicaid and Medicare in order to undo this damage. Click here to send a message to Congress telling them to invest in these critical programs, not cut them. OBBBA is the exact opposite of the "War on Poverty." The bill was passed with brutal cuts to health care to fund more tax handouts for the very wealthy. It took from the poor to give to the rich. The unpopularity of these cuts cannot be overstated. Eighty-three percent of the American public, including three in four Republicans, has a favorable view of Medicaid. Congress must hear from us loud and clear: reverse course, undo the harm to Medicaid and Medicare, and protect health care for more than 71 million people. Join us in sending the message to Congress to invest in these critical programs, don't cut them. 1 The Truth About the One Big Beautiful Bill Act’s Cuts to Medicaid and Medicare 2 Research Memo: Projected Mortality Impacts of the Budget Reconciliation Bill 3 Medicaid keeps getting more popular as Republicans aim to cut it by $800 billion

Lisa's Letter - July Newsletter

By Lisa Salberg • July 3, 2025
Summer, greetings to all our big-hearted friends As July approaches, our focus is already on the fall and preparing for some major events, including our annual meeting coming up in October. July will also find us on the west coast in Seattle conducting a regional patient education meeting as part of our big-hearted warrior tour. We have been following the generic drug quality issue in the United States very closely and encourage you to watch the series starting with our Hill briefing in April and following with the additional webinars with our partners at Medshadow and the People's Pharmacy, and of course the ProPublica series of articles. See them all here . We are happy to have a new team member on board - we welcome Pam as our coordinator of both our All Hearts Collaborative and Hearts and Minds project. Over the next few months, you're going to be learning more about these two amazing initiatives and how we are working to provide better services for big hearts regardless of where you live, so we are meeting all of our big-hearted friends where they are. Please stay tuned for updates from these projects coming soon. We are also creating new volunteer opportunities and engagements that we hope will make it easier for you to participate in spreading the message of the importance of diagnosis, the importance of community readiness related to CPR and AED use and, of course, helping patients get to their ultimate diagnosis and getting them on the proper treatment pathways. This July I would like to recognize all of the special birthdays in my family, including HCMA Center of Excellence coordinator, Stacey Titus-brown and my daughter Rebecca Salberg. It's a milestone birthday for Becca - it’s hard to believe I have a 30-year-old child. Wishing you all a happy and healthy summer. Go build some memories!
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