THE DAY I DIED


At the moment I am siting on the couch where I died on January 12, 2004. This may sound strange to you, but let me explain.

That day was like any other as I made my way from Wilmington, to the charter school in Exton to conduct my volunteer honors chemistry lab. As I drove up I felt great because I really liked being around smart and motivated young people. The lab I taught had three girls and four boys. In my judgement they were all kids destined to do well in college, although only three of them were what I sensed as really exceptional in chemistry.

I arrived a few minutes before nine as required and set up the materials for the days lab. I also spread out the written procedures which I had prepared a few days before. I loved the preparation writing because it allowed me to impart my love of chemistry and obsession with safety. I felt great in my business attire with a tie and a brand new blue shirt just bought from J. B. Banks & Sons.

The lab hour went well, but toward the end I began to feel a pain between my shoulders. It got fairly intense, but I had experienced this before. For several months, almost on a weekly basis I had been awakened by such a pain. In those cases I quietly got up to avoid disturbing my wife and went to the kitchen to take two aspirin with a small glass of coke. I would then sit and watch television till the pain subsided and the rapid irregular beating of my heart stopped. I thought little of the arrhythmia and the pain because I knew I was too healthy and strong to have anything really wrong with me.

To continue the story of that day, I suddenly found myself anxious to get out of the school and go home. I cleaned up hastily with the pain building. I was anxious for some aspirin and a coke. I kept a happy face on as I bid Mr. Thelman, the chemistry teacher goodbye.


The drive home was extremely uncomfortable as I was not only in pain, but I was sweating. I sensed something was bad and even considered driving to the West Chester hospital. Instead, I drove to my daughter Mary’s home in West Chester to get the coke and aspirin. This was a fateful decision that saved my life.

To my surprise, my grandson Stefan was home because of a cold and the baby sitter, Cindy Filoromo was there caring for him. As I entered the house I recall being annoyed at this because I was not in the mood for explaining things and I did not want to look weak in front of either of them.

I told Cindy I had a backache and got myself the aspirin and coke. Cindy said she did not like the way I looked and thought she should call an ambulance. I said absolutely no to such a move and I told her I was confident I would be fine in a few minutes. She objected, but agreed to my wishes.

I then felt like I needed to go to the bathroom. I climbed upstairs and did so expecting this would reduce my growing discomfort. I came down and sat on the couch. Cindy grew more alarmed and my grandchild looked at me curiously and smiled.

I kept fussing on the couch and told Cindy the pain was bad. She finally said, “I’m calling 911”. I feebly started to object, but said, “OK”. In a few minutes a policeman came to the door and came in to see me. I told him I was sure I was going to feel better soon. Shortly a huge man entered named Stanley. He was the chief paramedic.

He sat to my left, placed a blood pressure cuff on me and began to insert a needle into my left arm. The couch sank with Mr. Stanley’s weight. This distracted me for a minute. He said, “On a scale of one to ten how intense is the pain?” To make sure he would give me a strong pain killer I said, “ Oh, about 8”.

I then looked across at the fireplace and said,” I’m going”. Stanley said, “I know”.

My next memory is looking up from the floor at Stanley and hearing him say, “Mr. you were just dead.” I said, “That’s interesting”. He repeated the “Just dead” remark, and I felt no alarm. My memory of the actual act of going unconscious was simply a black curtain falling and no more pain.

I was told later they used the defibrillator and an adrenaline shot to the heart. Technically I guess I was really dead. Next came the ambulance ride.

Wow, was that uncomfortable! I remember them shoving me into the back of the ambulance. The ride to the hospital was mercifully short, and extremely bumpy and uncomfortable. The ambulance door flew open at the emergency door and a bunch of people ushered me along hallways into what was probably the catheter prep room.

I was fully awake and feeling fine. They told me to sit up and they would cut my shirt off: My beautiful brand new blue shirt. I said, “No way”. and tried to unbutton it. To no avail, the next thing I knew they had torn it off and I was back flat on my back. Then an uncomfortable feeling was evident in my inner right thigh. By this time I was woozy and only partly awake. Time went by with a lot of talking. The a voice said to me. “Do you want to see a movie of your artery being stented?” I said, “Yes, but really didn’t pay much attention. Soon I was laying in a room surrounded by my wife and other family. They all looked down at me like they weren’t sure what to say. I began to feel sorry for myself and for the first time wondered if I was going to make it. I caught myself and concluded I was fine.

After five uncomfortable days in the hospital I got out and began my recovery. Other than an incident a month later with irregular heart beat that sent me back for four more stents my recovery has been uneventful.

So, dying is just like general anesthesia. You are here one minute and gone the next. The only way you know you died is because you woke up. This is a strange realization which puzzles me to this day. It is odd, that I now realize that when I die for good I will never know it. It’s not just money that you can’t take with you, its knowledge of your own existence that is also lost. All one can do is enjoy life and try to make others enjoy your life by doing your best to be decent and nice. I try to live this way, but fail too often.

AFTERTHOUGHTS


I’ve often thought about my Catholic Church’s fixation on “miracles” as a required basis for sainthood. I am sure this is a good criteria, but I often wonder about the prevalence of “miracles”

Certainly I had an improbable series of “miracles” that fateful day. My decision to go to my daughter’s, the fact my grandson was home and therefore the babysitter was there, the insistence by the babysitter to call 911, the fact I took two aspirin may well have started dissolution of the fresh clot that was killing me, the quick response of the paramedics, the fact my body waited till they arrived to render me unconscious, the short ride to the well equiped hospital (I believe from the time I passed out till I had a functioning stent was about 30 minutes), and of course the competency of all the people involved including West Chester Hospital’s recently acquired top catheterization surgeon Dr. Timothy Boyek and the heart doctor Dr. Donna Reed. In my opinion “miracles” are every where and daily occurrences for all of us. We just don’t recognize them and the fact that God is with us all the time.