I WANT TO GO TO HEAVEN BUT NOT TODAY
ON WEDNESDAY, MAY 14, 2014, I had a stroke. I was discharged from the hospital today, May 18, 2014, and wrote the following update for my friends to explain what condition my condition is in.
Well, I just heard the word.
Some of you may know that I had a stroke last Wednesday here in Denver while visiting Candice. A physician who is an expert in strokes appeared this morning and told me that I was extremely lucky. That is what I call Stroke Center Calvinism. She said that I had a small stoke. When I asked her what that meant, she said that when one has a stroke, 30,000 brain cells die per second. So time is of the essence. One has to be acted upon at the same speed as the doctors, nurses, and patients in the Congo who are charging in a stampede through the glass doors of the hospital after they discover there is a man in the building who has the Ebola Virus. Else, the result is what they see here often for those whose care was delayed. Many lose entire function of a portion of their bodies- paralysis- which can never be recovered by any amount of rehab. Some go blind, some can never speak again because the brain may know what it wants to say, but the person cannot get the brain to formulate the words, and others may may lose all ability to think and conceptualize anymore. It all depends how soon they can get this life-saving IV in them called TPA- the stroke anti-venom.
In my case, it was the same thing as if I had been bitten by a black mamba in Africa right on the hospital steps of the only hospital in Kenya where they stored the anti-venom because this happened 5 miles away from the only and the premier stroke center in the Rocky Mountain region. As I was riding in the ambulance and being stuck in the arm by the EMT, I head him yell into a squawking radio, "Stroke Alert!" It was like TV. When they jerked me out of the ambulance, it was as if I was President Kennedy coming into Parkland in 1963. An army of doctors and nurses attacked me and dragged me off to a CRT(an MRI machine) and started ramming me into it. About 10-12 doctors and nurses all stood around feverishly barking medical crap, all of which I understood completely, while trying to jam me into that MRI submarine. I screamed out that I was claustrophobic and if they would like to have a multi-million dollar fundraising campaign to buy a replacement for this one to just keep pushing. PLUS, if they had never seen what a full-blown resurrection looks like, that event would help them make the case at their first fundraising dinner when the need for another MRI machine was introduced.
But all of this was all remarkable. I never knew people took a stroke so seriously. Some time later they thought they would revisit the MRI idea, and like Noah, a prophet of doom, I started warning them of the consequences of carrying out this plan. Like the fools watching the Ark being built and with all the medical know-it-all that you will see among medical people who think they have seen everything, they started to inch me toward my mortal nemesis. The closer I got, the more my stomach began to alert me that it would handle everything in its own way and soon deliver a big surprise for everyone just before launch time. The doubters happily joked and banged their way along the walls and through the doors on their way to the MRI. I was ushered into the room where the Alien sat with its mouth wide open, ready to receive me. That is when a reenactment of The Exorcist took place. The nurse who was cajoling me to mount the flat car for the ride into the beast's cavity must have seen evil coming. She started backing up, and that is when my stomach decided to learn her reaI good. I hosed her down with a stream of projectile vomit, and she catapulted backwards and almost landed inside of the MRI herself.
So one day they decided to take a look at any motor skills I may have had left in my legs. They got a seat belt on me and had me stand. The nurse said, "OKay, start tramping your feet up and down.'As I started doing so, words from the 1950s poured over my lips as i impulsively began singing," Who's the leader of the club that's made for you and me? M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E." Strokes can conjure up strange things in people.
I was also fortunate in that they know what caused the stroke. Atrial Fibulation, one of the major causes. So they know how to treat me and prevent it from happening again.A deluge of very aggressive drugs. I am about to build my own personal pharmacy.
Lastly, I am writing this from my daughter's. I was discharged at 2 pm this Sunday afternoon without any rehab prescribed at all, 5 days after a major medical event.When I look in the mirror, I see a cross between Homer Simpson and a bulldog. My speech still sounds like I have been sitting in The Hogsbreath Saloon all day shoving down margaritas, and the left corner of my mouth sags. To me, I sound a liitle bit like some of those people I have met who have cerebral palsy. But all should be normal very soon, said they, and I should be restored to my full inimitable self with the same evil thoughts I used to know after saying "How now brown cow' about a million times. But one good thing about this is that I now have a good idea how it is all going to end one day. But not yet. I checked into the Roach Hotel Wednensday morning, and somehow I checked out today.
Thanks to many of you who found this out via FaceBook and sent me your well wishes and prayed personally or in a couple of prayer chains. The Lord answered those prayers, assuming, of course, you were praying the same things I was.
By September 2014, I was fully recovered in every way. I was speaking normally and was as energetic as I had ever been. No trace of having had a stroke was evident in any way. I now take this drug called Pradaxa, which a cardiologist said took the probability of another stroke to as close to ZERO as it would ever become.
Well, I just heard the word.
Some of you may know that I had a stroke last Wednesday here in Denver while visiting Candice. A physician who is an expert in strokes appeared this morning and told me that I was extremely lucky. That is what I call Stroke Center Calvinism. She said that I had a small stoke. When I asked her what that meant, she said that when one has a stroke, 30,000 brain cells die per second. So time is of the essence. One has to be acted upon at the same speed as the doctors, nurses, and patients in the Congo who are charging in a stampede through the glass doors of the hospital after they discover there is a man in the building who has the Ebola Virus. Else, the result is what they see here often for those whose care was delayed. Many lose entire function of a portion of their bodies- paralysis- which can never be recovered by any amount of rehab. Some go blind, some can never speak again because the brain may know what it wants to say, but the person cannot get the brain to formulate the words, and others may may lose all ability to think and conceptualize anymore. It all depends how soon they can get this life-saving IV in them called TPA- the stroke anti-venom.
In my case, it was the same thing as if I had been bitten by a black mamba in Africa right on the hospital steps of the only hospital in Kenya where they stored the anti-venom because this happened 5 miles away from the only and the premier stroke center in the Rocky Mountain region. As I was riding in the ambulance and being stuck in the arm by the EMT, I head him yell into a squawking radio, "Stroke Alert!" It was like TV. When they jerked me out of the ambulance, it was as if I was President Kennedy coming into Parkland in 1963. An army of doctors and nurses attacked me and dragged me off to a CRT(an MRI machine) and started ramming me into it. About 10-12 doctors and nurses all stood around feverishly barking medical crap, all of which I understood completely, while trying to jam me into that MRI submarine. I screamed out that I was claustrophobic and if they would like to have a multi-million dollar fundraising campaign to buy a replacement for this one to just keep pushing. PLUS, if they had never seen what a full-blown resurrection looks like, that event would help them make the case at their first fundraising dinner when the need for another MRI machine was introduced.
But all of this was all remarkable. I never knew people took a stroke so seriously. Some time later they thought they would revisit the MRI idea, and like Noah, a prophet of doom, I started warning them of the consequences of carrying out this plan. Like the fools watching the Ark being built and with all the medical know-it-all that you will see among medical people who think they have seen everything, they started to inch me toward my mortal nemesis. The closer I got, the more my stomach began to alert me that it would handle everything in its own way and soon deliver a big surprise for everyone just before launch time. The doubters happily joked and banged their way along the walls and through the doors on their way to the MRI. I was ushered into the room where the Alien sat with its mouth wide open, ready to receive me. That is when a reenactment of The Exorcist took place. The nurse who was cajoling me to mount the flat car for the ride into the beast's cavity must have seen evil coming. She started backing up, and that is when my stomach decided to learn her reaI good. I hosed her down with a stream of projectile vomit, and she catapulted backwards and almost landed inside of the MRI herself.
So one day they decided to take a look at any motor skills I may have had left in my legs. They got a seat belt on me and had me stand. The nurse said, "OKay, start tramping your feet up and down.'As I started doing so, words from the 1950s poured over my lips as i impulsively began singing," Who's the leader of the club that's made for you and me? M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E." Strokes can conjure up strange things in people.
I was also fortunate in that they know what caused the stroke. Atrial Fibulation, one of the major causes. So they know how to treat me and prevent it from happening again.A deluge of very aggressive drugs. I am about to build my own personal pharmacy.
Lastly, I am writing this from my daughter's. I was discharged at 2 pm this Sunday afternoon without any rehab prescribed at all, 5 days after a major medical event.When I look in the mirror, I see a cross between Homer Simpson and a bulldog. My speech still sounds like I have been sitting in The Hogsbreath Saloon all day shoving down margaritas, and the left corner of my mouth sags. To me, I sound a liitle bit like some of those people I have met who have cerebral palsy. But all should be normal very soon, said they, and I should be restored to my full inimitable self with the same evil thoughts I used to know after saying "How now brown cow' about a million times. But one good thing about this is that I now have a good idea how it is all going to end one day. But not yet. I checked into the Roach Hotel Wednensday morning, and somehow I checked out today.
Thanks to many of you who found this out via FaceBook and sent me your well wishes and prayed personally or in a couple of prayer chains. The Lord answered those prayers, assuming, of course, you were praying the same things I was.
By September 2014, I was fully recovered in every way. I was speaking normally and was as energetic as I had ever been. No trace of having had a stroke was evident in any way. I now take this drug called Pradaxa, which a cardiologist said took the probability of another stroke to as close to ZERO as it would ever become.