I am watching the whole thing happen outside of myself. I see my myself stop talking in the middle of a sentence and start something like a seizure, my husband driving to the hospital fast and often on the wrong side of the road. The eight teenagers in shock, as Danny yells to call 911 and one actually calling 911. I see myself with my arms hugging myself, Danny and the hospital staff taking me out of the car and onto a gurney and into the emergency room. They cut off my clothes while another person does chest compressions while I am shaking and flailing around like I am having a seizure, they put a breathing tube down my throat because I am not breathing, which ends up paralyzing one of my vocal cords. My neck is bulging for reason's they don't know. They ask what drugs I am on and Danny says just anti depressants. They again ask what "drugs" I am on. He says NONE.
Am I aware of what I am feeling? Am I screaming inside with pain? Am I with loved ones from the other side. Am I alone...
Then my family is there. Autumn is having a hard time being in the room and keeps leaving to be with my children. Amber is there crying and thinking is should be her in the bed not me. My mother is crying so hard and so scared that she is needing oxygen. My Dad is like Autumn and has a hard time watching my heart start and stop over and over again. He goes outside to call my grandpa and asks him to pray for me. The doctors telling Danny that I am not going to make it, he tells them they are wrong. Sheri acting like she is my mother and thanking the doctors with little emotion and my mother telling Amber she wants the phony out of the room. My kids crying and scared with sweet Cheryl Gudmundson who comes to get Ashley but stays for my kids. She is soooo amazing. I love her so much.
The bishopric giving me a blessing and my heart stabilizing shortly after. The doctors telling Danny I have bleeding in my brain and they still think it is seizure related and they need to cool me down to stop brain damage and that if I wake up I won't be the same person. He also knows I HATE being cold and I am showing signs of not being happy. They decide to put me in a coma.They later find out it was my heart. They have NO idea why the strange things happened to me. Danny knows my wishes to be let go and not living off of machines. I have been planning my funeral and wishes to him for months now. I knew this was going to happen. The doctors could have never found it, until it got bad... for me it was death. He knows I wish to be cremated and scattered in the beautiful and peaceful mountains I love so much. He also knows I HATE being cold and I am showing signs of not being happy. They decide to put me in a coma.
My mother in law prepares for the worst, that I am not going to make it and starts organizing the garage so Danny and the kids can move in. She also ends up keeping my kids busy which they resent. They need to grieve and have space. The next day is Mother's Day. McKenna and Alisha cry the whole time, wishing they were anywhere but in a house full of people cheerfully saying Happy Mother's Day. I sooooo wish they didn't have to have gone through that...
They again tell Danny there is a slim chance I will wake up. If I do there will be severe brain damage. I will never again be the wife and best friend he knows. Danny is hopeful and stays with me day in and day out. Eventually they talk him into going home to shower and sleep.
They start to wake me up and see if I can breath on my own. I wake up to become agitated and upset. I keep trying to remove the breathing tube so they put me in a coma again. They try again the next day. This process is long but I wake up. I don't remember but again I am trying to remove the breathing tube and they decide to strap my hands down, but Danny feels that that would frustrate me more so he holds my hands down. I don't really answer questions, but they tell Danny that to go home and they will try again tomorrow. As they are putting me to sleep, they ask me questions and I answer. The nurse is so excited she calls and wakes Danny to tell him. The next day they wake me and when I open my eyes, I see Danny. He is rubbing my hair and he asks "Hi honey do you know where you are?" I say while a rush of panic goes through me "Yes, I am in the wrong hospital for our insurance." He laughs, but I look around and see lots of machines and they tell me not to worry it is okay. He tells me that it is McKenna's birthday. I start crying and say " oh no. Tell her I am sorry!" They all smile and he says she just wants me to get better. I start to think about it and I don't know why I am here....
Danny then asks me if I remember what happened? I shake my head no and he says " We were in the car, you don't remember?" I again shake my head no and think we were in a car accident. I immediately look to see if he has cuts or bruises. He then he tells me it was my heart. It was racing and then stopped.
The first thing I think is NOOOOOOOO I would rather be in a car accident!! No not my heart. I knew this was coming. I was so scared, but on the outside I was calm. I could feel tears run down my face. He then asks me if I remembered MORP. I don't and he I notice he is a little worried. It takes time, but later he shows me pictures and it all came back to me. The group of kids were there when this happened. I feel so embarrassed and horrified for McKenna and me. I ruined there dance date. The kids, my brothers Chris and mom are the first people I see. They looked so elated but you could still see the stress and worry. It was a beautiful moment though.
The doctors start calling me a miracle because I woke up, seem to have no severe brain damage that they can see and I can breath on my own. They still don't know how well my brain is and I am on strong meds for the separated sternum and bruised/cracked ribs. I go for MRIs and have tests done to check my throat and vocal chords. They stick a thing down my throat and tell me to swallow blue die while they look at my vocal chords. Now they ask me to make noise and then tell me that one of the chords are paralyzed and I now have a speech therapist. I also have fluid drained from around my lungs. They had Danny hold me up, because I couldn't do it myself and stuck a huge needle into my back. OUCH! They drained a lot and I was at this point thinking I have had enough!
The next days are blurs, I see family and friends and doctors, who stare at me like I am a freak. Then Dr. Wang comes in to tell me about my heart. I have the hereditary condition my mom has. I feel devastated to actually hear it. Left chamber is enlarged and not working well. The heart monitor alarm is going off quite often and it scares me. They tell me they are going to put in a defibrillator/pace maker. It won't pace my heart unless it needs it, which it hasn't really. Just once at home. The defibrillator will work if it stops and it will feel like getting kicked in the chest. They repeat this often and I figure my heart is so bad that I will probably die again soon. I wait for this with fear and anxiety, which causes the alarms to go off more. They give me meds to relax me, but I still feel scared. I can barely move my arms and am so tired. I see my swollen legs and hands and then a few days later gone...along with 25 pounds. That is one way to lose weight, mostly muscle though.
I am dizzy and can not walk to the wheelchair without falling. Even with people holding me. I feel so helpless...like a nothing. Will this be the rest of my life? Why didn't I just die?
Then we go for surgery. I am scared out of my mind, but Bryan is with me and taking pictures. It lifts my spirits a lot. Next, I wake up in pain, unable to use my left arm and freaked out that there is a box inside me. I try my best not to think about it but it all seems so horrific.
Then ...
I finally use the bathroom and fall of suddenly. I am talking but no one understand me and is freaking out. I don't understand why. I keep telling them I am just tired. I wake up to the inability to really move my left arm and leg and they tell me a blood clot went to my brain from my heart due to it not pumping very well. My head hurts so bad and I way more nauseous that normal. They give me blessed pain pills, but it only kind of works. I now also have a physical therapist to help me regain the use of my left side and Jim, my speech therapist working with me too. This is the time I start my period again two weeks after my last. They say this is common for a traumatic experience, but it is one more thing to deal with. I have MRIs one to two times a day. I also got bed baths and they even shaved my legs! I can't move myself so people are always moving me and modesty is no longer an issue.
At this time, I start to notice my slow talking isn't 100% from being tired and that I don't remember things like I used to. I can't do simple math, it takes awhile to come up with the answer and time story problems questions are hard. I am quickly recovering from the stroke but there is a horrible taste to food and drinks. It is so bad that I won't take more than a bite, however, I still drink the water because I am so thirsty from the meds. They threaten to put a feeding tube down my throat so I try to eat a little more, but I am so sick. I had to take nausea meds the whole time there and months afterwards.
I am so weak, that I need help to move in bed to get more comfortable. I am hooked to machines and tubes. It is annoying and my blood is being taken morning and night. After awhile, the whole arm they can use is so bruised, they try other areas. Then I notice these tiny scars around my groin. Some from stapling tubes to me and the others from the neurologist going into my brain. I have two more from the surgery in July.
I seemed to have good spirits and people told me I was funny. At night though, I was scared. I had panic attacks about the whispering I could hear. I asked Danny once about who was hiding behind my bed laughing and whispering. I ended up going for an MRI!
People also kept asking if I saw anyone that had passed on. I said my Grandma, but don't remember saying it or her. :'( I did feel family members around me from the other side, but I kept it to myself so I didn't have to have another MRI.
When I had the second stroke, I noticed it. Jim had just left and my food arrived. I didn't want to eat so I went to pick up my squeeze cube and noticed that I could feel my hand but could not move it. Then I panicked screaming in my head for my hand to move and it wouldn't. I told Danny and I was rushed to the operating room. This whole time i was lucky to have this doctor here in Utah that invented this new way of breaking down clots. I sat laid on the freezing cold table, no blanket and watched them get ready. I asked when they would put me to sleep, but they told me they couldn't because I had one bite of food! ONE! I started freaking out and they numbed my leg, gave me something that was supposed to help me relax and went in through my groin to my brain. They put this white screen up to my head and told me to hold still. A nurse asked me if I was alright and I said no. They told me only 5% of people can feel this and I won't even notice what is going on. They were sooooo wrong. They told me it was very important to hold absolutely still because they have this wire tool up in my brain and it could easily tear apart and damage the brain. I felt burning searing pain in my brain and could hear them saying that they were having a hard time getting it. I laid there with tears streaming down my face trying not to move, but eventually started saying oh my god over and over because it hurt so bad. I then started to swear and cry. I begged them to stop and they did saying that they could not get it and that I may never use the left side again. They went out to talk to Danny and then my personal nurse went running out. He had asked me to move my left hand and I did. So he told Danny and the Doctor went running back to check me. Another miracle!
I continued to heal rather fast and my therapists were excited to see my quick progress, but I still had such a long way to go.
They put me on laxatives which started the months of diarrhea. It was so bad I barely ate still. In the hospital, the toilet was in the room and next to the window. I could barely walk let alone get myself unhooked from the many wires and humiliated. The diarrhea lasted for over a month. It was horrible. I was dropping more weight and so tired. I also had super chapped skin on my back rear end and legs from being in bed.
I am also waiting for what horrible thing would come next.
I just wanted to go home.
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I replayed this over and over in my head at night and cried quietly so Danny wouldn't know. Going home was worse because I didn't know what was happening inside me. I also felt very out of place in my own life. I wanted to take my life everyday. Now I don't cry so much at night when it runs through my mind. It is just a sad movie with some great miracles.
What a long story. Will it be a long life?
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