The Spirit of the Matter

I am into my third week of illness and confinements of the plushness that is my bed. I can safely say the whole "resting" part of my recovery is getting old; it is for the birds, if you will. I had to return to the hospital this past weekend because my main cardiologist was not returning my calls and I was feeling worse by the hour. In short, the inflammation, caused by the virus, had spread from the muscle walls of the heart to the pericardial sack and a few spots near the sides of my lungs. Lucky me, right?

Well, that question is actually the main point for this post. While I was in the week long stay in the hospital for the initial diagnosis, there was a chaplain on staff for the hospital that came to visit and talk with me every day. An extremely kindhearted, wise Christian man who showed great worry and great promise for my health and stability. He was truly a man of the Word, and I greatly appreciate his companionship. Throughout the week and our encounters he had one question he always asked every day, "how is your spirit today?"

With the multitude of the medical things that were happening to me at the time, I honestly did not dive deep into the question, at the time. Along with that question he would ask if I ever wondered "why me" or "why would You do this?" I would always respond with "nope, I do not wonder the why, I just know this is happening, and I have to and will get through it to the end. I know my savior will help me through it." I honestly do not wonder why this is all happening to me. I firmly believe everything happens for a reason. Every test and every joy we experience is meant for out lives; it is our plan that is already laid out for us.

At the end of my stay, when I was sitting in a wheelchair waiting for my mom to pick me up to take me to my home, that same chaplain was hurrying by, made eye contact with me and yelled out "ah, I caught you before you left!" So he came by, pulled up a nearby chair and we had our last talk before he walked out and helped me into my mother's car. One of his last remarks to me was "I have never met a person with a stronger spirit than you. Thank you so much for letting me spend time with you and getting to know you. I will continue to pray for your recovery." Right there at that moment, I was pretty much speechless. All I could say was "You are truly a gift, thank you. Thank you."

Never met a stronger spirit? No one has ever said anything like that to me; it still resonates within me. I honestly do not know how to "digest" that compliment. There were a couple of times where I was close to passing on to the next world during my week stay in the hospital. Even now, if I do not follow my recovery plan, the virus could damage my heart so badly that I could die in a moment's notice. Yet, it still does not deter my spirit. I know I have gone through some terrible things in my short life already. I have been broken down in absolute shambles, having no idea if I will have a life's breath within the hour. I have learned that even in my darkest times I have never been forsaken, beaten to the point where I can no longer stand. I have always had my God, my Holy Spirit there to help bring me back up. It took a lot of stubbornness and mistakes to learn that, but I know that I am never truly broken down to the point I cannot get back up. I might be given something that can knock me down, but it is never something that inhibits me from getting right back up and fighting once more.

I will probably never understand the purpose for this illness. People have said "oh, it is just God's way of saying 'slow down'." That might be true since I practically live on the edge of my seat and I am always stressed over something. I am always busy and I rarely get to enjoy down time. So those people might be right, but I do not quite see it that way. Talking with that gentleman for the week did open my eyes to a lot of matters in my own life. Things I know I will need to address; things I know that I cannot keep on the back burner for much longer. I do know that one of the main reasons for the strength of spirit is the love and support that I received from family and friends that week. A had a lot of visitors come in even though I was in respiratory isolation, and an overwhelming amount of messages from people that could not visit. I thank those people for building and reinforcing my spirit. It does not waiver because of their love.

I am on the mend, and I have a few more weeks before I will be close to my old self again. I am still not finished with this spirit matter. I feel I might blog on this again soon. Until then, stay healthy my friends. Staying bed all day is not as fun as it sounds!

Fight for a better tomorrow

A Week of Near Death

This past week is been one for the record books...honestly. I can safely say that I was having a few dates with the grim reaper this past week. Today I was just released from the hospital after a week's stay in the Cardiac ICU and Cardiac Intermediate Care wing. I am here to tell the story of everything (well maybe not everything) that happened this past week:

Saturday night/Sunday morning around 1:00am I had returned home from a very long work day with an extreme headache and nausea. I was just flat out sore and tired, and I attributed the feelings of dismay to my recent Post Concussion Syndrome diagnosis from right before Thanksgiving. I readily and willingly climbed into bed in hopes to rest off the bad feelings. As the night and hours staggered on, my headache and an approaching fever were now getting the best of me. Tossing and turning, not able to sleep, I finally got out of bed around 4:00am to find some Tylenol and hopefully some cold/flu medicine so I could just whack this in the butt and be healthy by morning. Well as soon as I started to move around, I immediately felt worse. Dizzy, extremely nauseous, pounding headache, and facing the rim of a volcano in terms of my body heat, I had no medicine so I made the choice to go to the local Walmart. Right before I left, I took my temperature...a nice fever of 104 degrees Fahrenheit. Yes, it is high, but still not the end of the world right? Well not really...I run a usual body temp of slightly above 95 degrees. Weird I know, but I have always been that way. Trying to get a temperature in middle school was never fun. No one ever believed I was sick and practically dying with a 99.1 temperature.

Anyways, with a crazy high fever, and only a few degrees away from my brain melting, I called my mother so she could stay on the line while I drove to Walmart to get meds, just in case I passed out from the exertion and high fever. I did make it back home...barely. I immediately took some Tylenol and Nyquil and laid down to sleep. I had woken up around 8:30am on that same Sunday morning, with extreme chest pains. I was rolling around back and forth, in serious pain. I had figured maybe I took too much of the medicine. So I got up and started to walk around to see if the pain would subside. Five minutes later the pain got worse; much, much worse, and to top it all off I was starting to get short of breath. Fearing some serious complications I finally got myself in the car at 8:40am and drove myself to the nearest Urgent Care Center, where they know me pretty well. I walked into the Urgent Care with my hand on my chest. The receptionist nurse recognized me and immediately saw I was not well. I was literally as white as paper, hand clutching my chest, sweating and crying. The only thing I could choke out to say through the pain and tears was "I need help." I was taken back immediately and my hospitalized journey began.

The Urgent Care center called an ambulance to take me to the hospital because every sign pointed to me having a heart attack. The urgent care, EMTs, and the ER staff, that I was taken to, all concurred with the blood work and EKGs, and diagnosed me with a massive heart attack. Troponin, one of the key enzymes of heart muscle function had climbed to a ridiculous high of 28ug. A normal measure of Troponin is around 0.05ug. A usual heart attack is measured at a start of 2ug. Mine went up to 28ug. Not even people with congestive heart failure reach numbers that high on a regular basis. At a healthy status of 25 years old, you can safely say everyone was worried. Worried that I was soon to die. I was immediately taken into the heart catheter lab to open up any blockages my heart was bound to have. As soon as they got inside, they saw that my heart was open and clear. So, why would my heart show numbers well beyond a routine massive heart attack but have no blockages? The doctors were actually stumped. I was facing the pain from a heart attack but not receiving the damage from it.

To make this story end quickly, the doctors diagnosed me with Viral Myocarditis, a virus that causes extreme inflammation of the heart muscle. A condition that is mainly seen in elderly people, not young adults. They are unsure about the exact virus that invaded, but they believe it to be the Influenza Virus. Even though every flu test came back negative, they were certain it was the flu. I spent a week going through several tests, several medications, and a roller coaster ride of fevers. I was there for a week in isolation because they did not know what I was infected with. I had a total of four episodes of the "heart attack-like" pain. One is extremely painful and most do not come back from it. I had four, I am the lucky one.

I will blog more about the antics of the heavy narcotics and delirious fevers resulting in calling one of my doctors Gonzo (the muppet), blaming the nursing staff of stealing my shoes, and several days of show tune singing. They are some seriously funny and embarrassing stories. I have already said too much here, so I will save the rest for later. I will also blog on the whole spirit of the matter. I was visited by a chaplain every day because of what I was facing.

Folks, I almost died a few times, it truly is scary. Never take this life for granted.

I will return shortly...

Fight for a better tomorrow