This is my story,
and why I do the things I do.

Germany, May 2004 - I was with my National Guard unit on Annual Training in the Spring of 2004. The trip was going better than I had expected. I'm not a big fan of Germany but the trip had provided a few days of great sightseeing and our project was progressing well. We were nearing the end of the three week trip when one evening I began to have pains in my lower abdominal area. I took some pain medication, but the dull ache and sporadic sharp pains only worsened. One of the medics that was with us looked me over and decided it was time to go to the base clinic.

After a GI cocktail and an hour or more of discomfort, it was decided that I needed to go into the local German Hospital, Krankhaus Eschenbach. Within thirty seconds of admitting me nurses diagnosed me with an inflamed gall bladder that would need to be removed, and they were right.

We discussed the options and I chose to have the surgery there and hopefully recover fast enough to still return home with my unit. The other option I was presented with involved me being drugged up on a plane at 35,000 ft. altitude somewhere over the Arctic, hoping that my gall bladder didn't rupture... possibly ending my life before I could get help. I decided on having the surgery (and I still stand by that decision).

The next morning I was wheeled in to have my gall bladder removed. The first surgery went fine, so I thought. I woke up feeling many times better. Throughout the day however, I would learn that my hematocrit was dropping, I would learn later that this is a sign of internal bleeding. The decision to do a follow up surgery was made and I was scheduled to go in for a second time so they could determine where I was bleeding, and to repair any damage that was discovered. I wouldn't awake again for ten days, and my life would be forever changed.

I cannot tell you exactly what happened. I only know from what I have heard from those close to me that were there. What I do know is that during the second surgery I developed Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS), and fell into/was placed into a coma. The hospital I was in did not have the capacity to adequately support my condition so I was transferred to a larger hospital, Klinikum Weiden.

My parents were called as I soon became a 'red cross message'. The Army flew them over to Germany for all intents and purposes of 'pulling the plug'. After they're arrival they would meet everyday with the doctors, base commanders, and my unit commander. The purpose of the meeting was to evaluate my condition and make decisions concerning my treatment. The question they were presented with for the first week was not "Is he getting better?", but rather "Is he getting any worse?" I was not, and so they would repeat this senario again the following day.

Day 5-6 of the coma, notice on the wall the many bottles of medications I am on (11?).

My girlfriend arrived on her own recognizance a few days later. My parents and her developed a 24 hour bedside vigil, my parents during the day and her throughout the night. It was after a few days of her arrival when she began playing music CD's she had bought at a European flee market to me with a laptop computer. I'm not sure how many nights she did this before it happened, but I'm glad it did. She had found one particular song that I like, and as the recognizable piano sounds hit my ears my brain awoke. Alarms on the machines monitoring my condition began going off and nurses and doctors rushed in the room. Confusion filled the room as the German medical staff pelted my wife with questions about what she had done. When she questioned them as to what was going on they only replied, he has brain activity! Something I hadn't had for a while.

It still took me a few days to fully come out of the coma and fit my reality back in with the rest of the world's. In the hell I was trapped in I watched loved ones get murdered, dined with evil men, experienced loved ones go away, and I believe I even turned down a deal made with the devil himself. The thing that is hard to explain is that I remember lots of things, mostly horrid hallucinations that I'll save for another day, but they were all very real to me. They comprised the horrid reality that I was trapped in.

 

The long road home.>>

 

Caring is good, doing something is better.