He had shortness of breath, jitters and blamed anxiety. It was heart failure at 30.

Like many people, Alex Balmes doesn’t like going to the doctor. So, when the 30-year-old started experiencing a myriad of symptoms, he shrugged them off, chalking the changes up to aging, anxiety or the pressures of being a busy dad.

But the bloating, weight gain and fatigue continued. He felt jittery. And despite having worked an active job in construction, his shortness of breath became so bad that he had trouble falling asleep.

A trip to the ER in 2024 revealed what he was really dealing with: late-stage heart failure.

“It was a massive shock to me and my family," Balmes says. "I was known in my family as the strong person, the one they called when they needed to move to a new house... It blew us away."

The jitters? Not nerves, but his heart not pumping properly. Trouble breathing? Not aging, but fluid leaking into his lungs. And all the rest − the bloating, weight changes and fatigue − were other common symptoms of heart failure that many are unaware of.