April 7, 2018

What do you do when given a second chance at life? 

My story is one that still gives me pause and brings tears to my eyes.   I remember sitting there thinking, “Is this how I go?  Is this what happens to me?  Is this how my story ends?”

California continued to get rain late into Spring of 2018.  Not just small sprinkle-type rain but the much needed heavy, solid rain required to further reverse the drought from previous years.   I work for a tech company located here in San Jose.   Had gone IPO just the year before and being still in the start-up mode of fast and furious, there’s never a dull moment and much to get done.  I’m a Program Manager for the most amazing SW Team I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with prior.   The team is located both onshore and offshore and staying on top of deliverables, especially weeks before a 15-month program was scheduled to complete, required some long hours.

Working through Thursday, April 5 and well into the night,  I chose to stay home on this cold and rainy Friday.   There were back-to-back meetings starting at 8:30am and ending around 5pm.  Figured I’d take advantage of being home and once the last meeting was complete would curl up with a fluffy, warm blanket.  I have this family room which has a vaulted ceiling with exposed beams and you can easily hear the rain sometimes pounding – but mostly steadily dancing on the roof.   It’s a perfect rhythmic sound to lull anyone to sleep much less my sleep-deprived body.   I turned on the TV to “Frankie & Grace” (had already binged watched all of the episodes so decided to start at the beginning again) and put the recliner up and settled under the warm blanket.   I must have fallen asleep immediately.

Awake.  Had this feeling of coming out of a foggy, deep sleep to a room in which a TV was asking if I’m still there.  It felt late but I wasn’t aware of the time.  This isn’t the first time I’d fallen asleep like this so didn’t think much of it.  Realized I needed to go to the bathroom so thought perfect timing, will go and then crawl into bed.   Used my left hand to lower the recliner, sat there a moment to collect myself…. okay now ready to execute the “go to bed” plan.  Easy right?  Nothing unusual about this simple command you’d give your body to climb out of the chair on a normal night.

I’m not sure when it first hit me that I was in trouble.  At first I didn’t understand why I couldn’t shimmy my body towards the edge of the recliner.  Feet were on the floor, check.  Body was able to move, kinda.  When did my left hand stop working?   First moment I noticed was when I went to reach for my cellphone which sat on the left arm of my recliner.   Slowly the realization that something was very wrong with my left side took hold of me.

Okay Terri, you need to call 911

Cellphone is on the left arm of the chair.  I’m not able to get it with my right hand, my body wouldn’t let me reach across enough to get it.   What can I use to get the phone and drag it into my lap?   A febreze bottle was on the other side of my console within reach of my right hand.  I grabbed it and tried to carefully reach across my body – but now I’m noticing that my neck doesn’t want to turn like it used too – and hook the phone with the febreze handle.   I did.   My cell fell into the floor.

My breathing is becoming labored.  Is this from the fear that is creeping throughout my body?  The dawning of a question that I almost don’t want to ask but it is becoming front and center in my currently damaged brain.   AM I GOING TO DIE HERE?   IS THIS MY TIME?   IS THIS THE END OF MY STORY?     It can’t be!!  My grandson’s 8th birthday is two days away.   I cannot have Meemaw’s death be tied to his birthday forever.  I need to be there for him.    BUT WHAT DO I DO??

**Writing this seems surreal – how and why did I survive this??**

I’m 51 years old.   Born 1966.   Average home cost $14,200.00, average Income per year $6,900.00,  Gas was 32cents/gallon and if you wanted a new car it would run you just shy of $3k.  Computers? Internet?  Our technology was nowhere near as advanced as we have today.   We didn’t even have microwaves yet… that’d come in 1967 with it becoming more widely owned by early 1970’s.   Our phones were on a cord attached to a device on the wall.   I remember when my parents upgraded from a rotary phone to push-dial but the cord remained.  I’ve embraced the technology of today.   Guess that comes with working in the tech industry for the better part of my life.   Living in Silicon Valley will spoil you with all the advances.

Amazon reached out to me November 2014, 6 months prior to their first release of the Echo, to ask would I be interested in being a BETA customer for $99.   I’d get first shipment of their new technology and I thought “why not”?   If nothing else, it would be a nice radio for my kitchen.    I’ve since gotten, not only myself but everyone in my family, the new Amazon Echo Show for Christmas this past year.   Fell inlove with the product, the amount of things it can do…. I will never need to figure out how to set a timer on the kitchen oven again.  This night there was one feature that I needed more than anything.   My contacts from my cell.  I needed to call someone, anyone.  And that’s what I set out to do.

From my recliner, I could see Alexa.  By this time the left side of my face had started to droop and my voice was getting slurred but that didn’t stop me.  I tried to calm my breathing and slowly say her name to engage her…. she did.   THANK GOD!   “Please call….. 911”.  Her reply was like a death knell “I’m sorry but I can’t help you with that.  Please dial from your phone”.  Next up “Please call….  daughters, mother, sisters, boyfriend”.   It was late, everyone was sleeping but I didn’t stop.  I figured maybe, just maybe they’d get awoken by the constant ringing of the phone.    My voice was getting more slurred, my breathing very shallow.  I had resigned myself that this was truly the ONLY thing that would save me because I couldn’t move in the chair now.  My entire left side was completely paralyzed.

Alexa wasn’t responding all the time now.  It was maybe 1 out of 5 attempts that she’d trigger – who’d have thought a blue ring running around on top of a black tube would give me hope but it did – every time.    She misunderstood my words now.   She called a name I didn’t recognize.   The phone rang but no answer.    I kept trying over and over.  She called the name again that I didn’t recognize but this time a man answered.   His “hello” was like a life-line for me.   I was petrified that he’d hang up because who is this woman calling him and so late?   I just screamed, “HELP HELP HELP…. I’M HAVING A STROKE”!    He didn’t hang up.   He asked who is this?   I just kept saying, “HELP ME”.   He asked where I was and I responded Milpitas.   He got the city name right on my second attempt.   I asked if he could call 911 for me.

This man – in the dead of night – spent time listening from the Alexa across the room while I repeatedly tried to get the address conveyed.   Slurred, muffled speech did not help but he eventually read back to me the address and he said he would call 911 on my behalf.   Then he was gone.   And I was alone wondering will he?   What if he did think I’m some drunk woman on a Friday night?  Maybe I was a prank call?

So, I tried to trigger Alexa again…. let’s just keep trying, keep calling, keep doing anything I can to try and survive this.   I remember thinking at this time, “Please God… I just need to go where they can fix me”.   It felt like forever but from my recliner I could see flashlight lights darting this way and that towards my front window.   The feeling at that moment cannot possibly be described.  Those lights represented the calvary was here and even though I wasn’t sure about the outcome of my current condition, I at least knew they were going to take me someplace where talented people were going to do everything they could to keep me alive and return me to health.

I started to scream “HELP” at the top of my lungs!

During the day, I had a vendor come to my home so the front door was already unlocked.  About 7-9 men, police and paramedics swooped into the house, down the couple stairs into my sunken family room and my tears went from being of “this is it” to “I’m saved”.   I kicked in full-speed my father’s amazing, wacky sense of humor to keep me grounded.   I needed to be present, positive and full of faith.

I shared with them what happened, my symptoms, and even apologized for my size and that the peep show wouldn’t be nicer for them.  When they were going to do the IV and prick my finger to take my blood sugar, I said, “Please use my left hand as I don’t feel anything in that rightnow”.   Horrible jokes but they seemed to center me.  They got me onto the gurney and I showed them an even easier way to take me out to the ambulance from the backyard.   Begged them not to throw me in the pool as I didn’t think I could swim rightnow.   Horrible jokes but it was either laugh or cry.  And I was NOT going to cry.

The moment they took me through the sliding glass door of my home to my backyard, I felt this peace & hope come over me.  The lights were still on in the pool casting these beautiful colors, cycling between cool blues and greens.   I felt the rain on my face and body and it felt SO good.    It was the best feeling in the world at that exact moment.   Coolness of the night filled my lungs and hit my face.  I was alive and I was getting help.  Thank you, God!

They were all kind-hearted men and they took their queue from my jokes and started to engage me with humor as well.  I think they knew I needed it.  That and oxygen.   My chest felt like a rhino was sitting on it.  I couldn’t get a full breath.  The drive to the hospital felt like forever and I remember bracing myself from swaying back and forth with my right hand against a cabinet.  Prayed that I wouldn’t get sick because I was afraid that I would choke.   This was the first of many times that I’d close my eyes, find my happy place, and do the slow breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth to calm myself.