Survival and Hope
Back from death's door - My small life miracle
07/05/08 07:58
This is a gory tale, and for those who are about to eat dinner or are feeling weak-hearted or squeamish, it may be best left to another time.
The main reason I wrote this piece about six months ago was by way of catharsis. From my own perspective, it's a remarkable story, a wonderful miracle and a real turning point in my life – a life-changing event. I am reproducing it here as I would never wish to forget the value of the gift of life.
I once wrote rather glibly that in March last year I almost bled to death. It was a little more serious than that. I don't know exactly how far I was away from death for real, maybe minutes, maybe hours, no longer than that. For most of us, other than that famous celebrity of one of the world's most popular stories, death is something that only happens once. On this occasion I was not ready for it.
It started on a Sunday. It was my good friend Mark's 49th birthday on the Monday, and we had organised a small 'not-much-of-a-surprise' birthday lunch. It was a real treat since he got to do a lot of the cooking! I was very happy with myself, as I had secretly sought out information about some of his favourite things that included the film "Spinal Tap". I had bought him the DVD and a couple more things besides. We had a great lunch. I drank Guinness, quaffed far too much red wine and feasted on roast beef. That was special for me as I rarely ate red meat.
On the Monday, I felt desperately ill. My vomit was black. "Oh! That's Guinness and roast beef," I thought! (What an idiot I can be!) Little did I realise that I was chucking almost my entire blood supply down the lavatory pan. Worst of all, please forgive me, Mark, I put it down to food poisoning!
Throughout that week I started to feel a little better. But I felt very odd whenever I stood up. I thought it was the effect of eating little or no food. On the Friday, I felt slightly better and took myself off to see Mark and have a sandwich at our local pub.
I don't think he will ever forget the moment when I uttered, "I don't feel well…no, I don't feel at all well. I must leave now…I must go."
The pub was two hundred yards from my home. After 50 yards I could not breathe, gasping hard… a vice-like tightness gripped my chest. It spread to my neck and upper arms. I thought, "Oh fuck! I know this one. I know what's happening to me."
I staggered on towards the small converted barn that was home then. There was a dreadful moment as I almost reached the door. It was like a voice inside me. It said, "You have a choice now. Go indoors, call an ambulance and get help, or keep walking and die." I was starting to go into cardiac arrest. My heart was pumping, thudding against my chest wall in an irregular beat as it fought furiously to gain the oxygen carried by haemoglobin that had all bled away. I discovered subsequently that my blood loss had probably exceeded, the amount of blood that remained in my body. Very few people have ever reached that point and lived.
I did think about that for two or three seconds. I was desperately unhappy at the time and death presented a fast way out of that misery, a very fast escape at that moment. "Why not walk on then?" said the voice. I thought, "Oh fuck off! No-one is going to do that to me, not me either!" Fuelled with black anger I made it through the door, called a neighbour who was a nurse and dialled 999 for an ambulance. Two paramedics, one on a motorcycle, one in a car, blue lights flashing were on the spot in well under five minutes. An ambulance arrived a couple of minutes afterwards. Oxygen, hypodermic needles, machines with flashing lights, I can't really recall what happened after that. I can remember bumping our way along the A40, blue lights reflecting, sirens blasting a space through the traffic. They had saved my life for the first time that day.
I don't think I made very much sense in the emergency room. I just remember odd details, like them saying, "his haemoglobin count is five point six, he needs a transfusion now."
"What should it be?" I asked. "About 13 or 14 normally," the doctor replied.
"He's going into hyperglycaemia," said the doctor, his blood sugars are 23." (Subsequently I found out that less than 7 is healthy.)
As it transpired many things that were going on in me were just about my body fighting for life, my metabolism going wild, and were not symptoms, but physical aberrations.
The worst words of the afternoon were, "Your troponin levels indicate that you have had a myocardial infarction, a heart attack."
I must have been out of my head as I replied, "It's good you know that. Can I go home now?"
The very kindly young doctors who saved my life again, one of whom was a beautiful young woman (in terms of her inner radiance and kindliness), explained that I was to be admitted and would remain in hospital for some days.
I was puzzled since before this last week I had been in seemingly perfect health, albeit I was overweight, a bit of a porker. But stay I did, and in that first three days I was transfused five units of blood. That's five pints and the body's capacity is about eight pints. This saved my life yet again.
The diagnosis was worse than bleak. I was thought to have heart disease probably as a result of hereditary and lifestyle risk factors, ulcerated gastritis that caused massive internal bleeding, and diabetes. Diabetes that frequently leads to blindness and limb amputations scared me shitless.
Wait for this! It transpired subsequently that each of these diagnoses was incorrect! I had none of these illnesses.
For the first three days in hospital I could hardly sleep; needle canulars in each arm, one with a drip and the other a blood transfusion meant that if I turned in my sleep I ripped my flesh painfully. Every time I went to sleep, sleep apnoea, triggered the respiratory alarm and woke me up. I stayed awake for the better part of three days.
To cut a long story short, I decided to declare war on aspects of my illnesses. First, it was the diabetes. Over and over, charming young nurses came to see me and insisted I should give in to the regimen that diabetes entailed. I sometimes raged and swore, more than that, I begged, to just be given a chance to lose weight, get fit and exercise and see what happened. Equipped with a blood sugar meter, that involved piercing myself several times daily, drawing blood and recording the results, I left hospital.
I delivered on my word: Healthy diet and exercise first. After two or three weeks my blood sugar levels returned to normal. After some more severe tests, it was concluded that I did not have diabetes.
I started cardiac rehabilitation classes at the gym and they were the strangest experience: working the rowing machine with two nurses and a defibrillator on-hand. Unlike many of the other ex-patients I found the exercises to be a walk in the park. I never had any chest pain and wondered when I might get to do some real exercise! To compensate, I walked briskly every day often for five or six miles, sometimes between eight and twelve miles at weekends. My weight came plummeting down and I felt better for it. In fact, I felt fitter than I had felt for years.
At the hospital I began a battery of tests. First was an endoscopy and colonoscopy, about three months after the episode. The results showed a large healing peptic ulcer, but no other problems there. The gastroscopist recorded one very important piece of information that my other doctors missed and / or misinterpreted.
Physically, I felt well again.
More tests: I had damaged a small amount of heart tissue, but not that much, subsequent tests showed this was healing and has subsequently healed. My ECG and all other conventional tests all indicated that I was in normal health. My cardiologist, a wonderful, considerate and very bright German doctor, decided to carry out some more drastic and conclusive testing of my heart and cardiovascular system. The final test scared me so much that I had postponed it once for a month since I could not cope with any more bad news.
I had bought a bike for cardiovascular exercise as the regime of the gym treadmill bored me beyond belief. I enjoyed cycling and went out most days and rode up and down sometimes steep hills, usually for about 12 miles around where I lived in the Cotswolds.
In the last week of August, I had two hospital appointments: One for my stomach problems and the final big test of my heart and cardiovascular system.
The medical doctor who I saw for my stomach problems asked if I had completed my course of antibiotics. "What course of antibiotics?" I asked. During my internal examination, it had been determined that I had tested positive for the bacterium, helicobacter pylori, a nasty little germ that causes ulcers. The bacterium can be eradicated with a hefty dose of antibiotics, aerobic and anaerobic antibiotics taken together.
So I had a bloody germ that had caused my ulcers that in turn had perforated and almost caused me to bleed to death. It transpired that the gastrocopist's report had been misread and misinterpreted by a cardiologist who had reported back to me that I had tested negative for H. Pylori. I got my prescription and took the course of medication to slay this insidious germ!
On the day of the big heart tests, I was shitting myself. I was so scared that I barely slept the night before. At 5:30 that morning I had gone out on my bike and rode like a demon. Since the episode I have lost over 35 lbs in weight, I now look and feel so much better. I'm fitter too and intend to keep it that way. I can walk up hills more quickly than some of my fit friends in their thirties who gasp for breath. This really does make me smile!
This piece is already too long: The results of the tests were better than my life's best surprise. My heart and cardiovascular system were declared normal and 100% healthy! I wept in the test room, I almost embraced and kissed my wonderful German cardiologist when he told me. His words went something like, " You have the healthiest heart I have seen today…er this week…or this month for that matter." He had to repeat himself three or four times before I could understand or believe him.
That day I felt euphoria! I have been feeling good ever since. I did learn some big lessons; my whole life's values shifted to embrace what, or should I say who, really mattered. Now I love and treasure life with all its difficulties. It's amazing!
Apparently all my problems were caused by an infection, a bloody germ. I have been tested otherwise for every illness known to man it seems. There is nothing more to say.
The main reason I wrote this piece about six months ago was by way of catharsis. From my own perspective, it's a remarkable story, a wonderful miracle and a real turning point in my life – a life-changing event. I am reproducing it here as I would never wish to forget the value of the gift of life.
I once wrote rather glibly that in March last year I almost bled to death. It was a little more serious than that. I don't know exactly how far I was away from death for real, maybe minutes, maybe hours, no longer than that. For most of us, other than that famous celebrity of one of the world's most popular stories, death is something that only happens once. On this occasion I was not ready for it.
It started on a Sunday. It was my good friend Mark's 49th birthday on the Monday, and we had organised a small 'not-much-of-a-surprise' birthday lunch. It was a real treat since he got to do a lot of the cooking! I was very happy with myself, as I had secretly sought out information about some of his favourite things that included the film "Spinal Tap". I had bought him the DVD and a couple more things besides. We had a great lunch. I drank Guinness, quaffed far too much red wine and feasted on roast beef. That was special for me as I rarely ate red meat.
On the Monday, I felt desperately ill. My vomit was black. "Oh! That's Guinness and roast beef," I thought! (What an idiot I can be!) Little did I realise that I was chucking almost my entire blood supply down the lavatory pan. Worst of all, please forgive me, Mark, I put it down to food poisoning!
Throughout that week I started to feel a little better. But I felt very odd whenever I stood up. I thought it was the effect of eating little or no food. On the Friday, I felt slightly better and took myself off to see Mark and have a sandwich at our local pub.
I don't think he will ever forget the moment when I uttered, "I don't feel well…no, I don't feel at all well. I must leave now…I must go."
The pub was two hundred yards from my home. After 50 yards I could not breathe, gasping hard… a vice-like tightness gripped my chest. It spread to my neck and upper arms. I thought, "Oh fuck! I know this one. I know what's happening to me."
I staggered on towards the small converted barn that was home then. There was a dreadful moment as I almost reached the door. It was like a voice inside me. It said, "You have a choice now. Go indoors, call an ambulance and get help, or keep walking and die." I was starting to go into cardiac arrest. My heart was pumping, thudding against my chest wall in an irregular beat as it fought furiously to gain the oxygen carried by haemoglobin that had all bled away. I discovered subsequently that my blood loss had probably exceeded, the amount of blood that remained in my body. Very few people have ever reached that point and lived.
I did think about that for two or three seconds. I was desperately unhappy at the time and death presented a fast way out of that misery, a very fast escape at that moment. "Why not walk on then?" said the voice. I thought, "Oh fuck off! No-one is going to do that to me, not me either!" Fuelled with black anger I made it through the door, called a neighbour who was a nurse and dialled 999 for an ambulance. Two paramedics, one on a motorcycle, one in a car, blue lights flashing were on the spot in well under five minutes. An ambulance arrived a couple of minutes afterwards. Oxygen, hypodermic needles, machines with flashing lights, I can't really recall what happened after that. I can remember bumping our way along the A40, blue lights reflecting, sirens blasting a space through the traffic. They had saved my life for the first time that day.
I don't think I made very much sense in the emergency room. I just remember odd details, like them saying, "his haemoglobin count is five point six, he needs a transfusion now."
"What should it be?" I asked. "About 13 or 14 normally," the doctor replied.
"He's going into hyperglycaemia," said the doctor, his blood sugars are 23." (Subsequently I found out that less than 7 is healthy.)
As it transpired many things that were going on in me were just about my body fighting for life, my metabolism going wild, and were not symptoms, but physical aberrations.
The worst words of the afternoon were, "Your troponin levels indicate that you have had a myocardial infarction, a heart attack."
I must have been out of my head as I replied, "It's good you know that. Can I go home now?"
The very kindly young doctors who saved my life again, one of whom was a beautiful young woman (in terms of her inner radiance and kindliness), explained that I was to be admitted and would remain in hospital for some days.
I was puzzled since before this last week I had been in seemingly perfect health, albeit I was overweight, a bit of a porker. But stay I did, and in that first three days I was transfused five units of blood. That's five pints and the body's capacity is about eight pints. This saved my life yet again.
The diagnosis was worse than bleak. I was thought to have heart disease probably as a result of hereditary and lifestyle risk factors, ulcerated gastritis that caused massive internal bleeding, and diabetes. Diabetes that frequently leads to blindness and limb amputations scared me shitless.
Wait for this! It transpired subsequently that each of these diagnoses was incorrect! I had none of these illnesses.
For the first three days in hospital I could hardly sleep; needle canulars in each arm, one with a drip and the other a blood transfusion meant that if I turned in my sleep I ripped my flesh painfully. Every time I went to sleep, sleep apnoea, triggered the respiratory alarm and woke me up. I stayed awake for the better part of three days.
To cut a long story short, I decided to declare war on aspects of my illnesses. First, it was the diabetes. Over and over, charming young nurses came to see me and insisted I should give in to the regimen that diabetes entailed. I sometimes raged and swore, more than that, I begged, to just be given a chance to lose weight, get fit and exercise and see what happened. Equipped with a blood sugar meter, that involved piercing myself several times daily, drawing blood and recording the results, I left hospital.
I delivered on my word: Healthy diet and exercise first. After two or three weeks my blood sugar levels returned to normal. After some more severe tests, it was concluded that I did not have diabetes.
I started cardiac rehabilitation classes at the gym and they were the strangest experience: working the rowing machine with two nurses and a defibrillator on-hand. Unlike many of the other ex-patients I found the exercises to be a walk in the park. I never had any chest pain and wondered when I might get to do some real exercise! To compensate, I walked briskly every day often for five or six miles, sometimes between eight and twelve miles at weekends. My weight came plummeting down and I felt better for it. In fact, I felt fitter than I had felt for years.
At the hospital I began a battery of tests. First was an endoscopy and colonoscopy, about three months after the episode. The results showed a large healing peptic ulcer, but no other problems there. The gastroscopist recorded one very important piece of information that my other doctors missed and / or misinterpreted.
Physically, I felt well again.
More tests: I had damaged a small amount of heart tissue, but not that much, subsequent tests showed this was healing and has subsequently healed. My ECG and all other conventional tests all indicated that I was in normal health. My cardiologist, a wonderful, considerate and very bright German doctor, decided to carry out some more drastic and conclusive testing of my heart and cardiovascular system. The final test scared me so much that I had postponed it once for a month since I could not cope with any more bad news.
I had bought a bike for cardiovascular exercise as the regime of the gym treadmill bored me beyond belief. I enjoyed cycling and went out most days and rode up and down sometimes steep hills, usually for about 12 miles around where I lived in the Cotswolds.
In the last week of August, I had two hospital appointments: One for my stomach problems and the final big test of my heart and cardiovascular system.
The medical doctor who I saw for my stomach problems asked if I had completed my course of antibiotics. "What course of antibiotics?" I asked. During my internal examination, it had been determined that I had tested positive for the bacterium, helicobacter pylori, a nasty little germ that causes ulcers. The bacterium can be eradicated with a hefty dose of antibiotics, aerobic and anaerobic antibiotics taken together.
So I had a bloody germ that had caused my ulcers that in turn had perforated and almost caused me to bleed to death. It transpired that the gastrocopist's report had been misread and misinterpreted by a cardiologist who had reported back to me that I had tested negative for H. Pylori. I got my prescription and took the course of medication to slay this insidious germ!
On the day of the big heart tests, I was shitting myself. I was so scared that I barely slept the night before. At 5:30 that morning I had gone out on my bike and rode like a demon. Since the episode I have lost over 35 lbs in weight, I now look and feel so much better. I'm fitter too and intend to keep it that way. I can walk up hills more quickly than some of my fit friends in their thirties who gasp for breath. This really does make me smile!
This piece is already too long: The results of the tests were better than my life's best surprise. My heart and cardiovascular system were declared normal and 100% healthy! I wept in the test room, I almost embraced and kissed my wonderful German cardiologist when he told me. His words went something like, " You have the healthiest heart I have seen today…er this week…or this month for that matter." He had to repeat himself three or four times before I could understand or believe him.
That day I felt euphoria! I have been feeling good ever since. I did learn some big lessons; my whole life's values shifted to embrace what, or should I say who, really mattered. Now I love and treasure life with all its difficulties. It's amazing!
Apparently all my problems were caused by an infection, a bloody germ. I have been tested otherwise for every illness known to man it seems. There is nothing more to say.
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