AFLW All Australian turned popular commentator Kate McCarthy is on the mend after being hospitalised with a heart scare.
The ex-Brisbane Lions player enjoyed a busy weekend featuring on Channel 7’s AFL grand final coverage before celebrating her former club’s premiership victory on Saturday and a thrilling two-point AFLW win on Sunday.
But the 31-year-old’s lifelong health battle reared its head at the airport on Monday.
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“When the @brisbanelions and @lionsaflw double over the weekend sends you into ventricular tachycardia,” McCarthy wrote.
“On the mend now but Monday night review shows pacemaker performing like the Swans on the big stage.”
McCarthy has had a pacemaker since she was 12 after a childhood littered with seizures.
McCarthy was first diagnosed with an ‘intermittent 3’ heart blockage after a seizure at the age of four or five.
The prospect of a pacemaker was mentioned at the age of 10, with the cardiologist hoping to be able to hold off.
A seizure in her first year of high school changed those plans.
“An ambulance came, and I had a seizure in the ambulance, then another one in the emergency department. I think I had seven seizures that day,” McCarthy wrote on AthletesVoice.
“When I had my seizures, I would lose consciousness for about 20 or 30 seconds when the seizure was happening, then come back to after that.
“I think the most concerning thing for Mum and Dad was that I was really into sport — I did triathlons, so lots of swimming and bike riding — and they were really worried about what would happen if something happened while I was swimming or bike riding.
“So I had emergency surgery the next day and they put a pacemaker in, and it was all fixed up from there. It’s never happened since then.”
A teacher by trade, McCarthy forged a successful career with the Lions, St Kilda and Hawthorn before finishing up in the AFLW.
She is now a rising star of footy media and already a key figure on Channel 7’s AFL and AFLW coverage, co-hosting panel shows Armchair Experts and Talking W.
