As I said in my last post, everything went black after the second spray of nitro was given to me. The last words I spoke were to call my mother. If I had to do it all over again, those would not have been my last words to my husband. As he was calling my mother I went into full blown cardiac arrest in front of his eyes.
One of my main arteries was blocked one hundred percent. As far as the doctors could tell, a piece of plaque broke off in one of my arteries. As far as they could tell it must have wedged and then my body’s natural repair system kicked in and started to clot where the plaque broke off. The problem was that it clotted and blocked the entire artery so there was no blood flowing to my heart.
The doctor and his team worked tirelessly on me for a little over thirty five minutes to try to bring me back. They gave me a clot buster hoping that would open the artery, even if it was just a little so that my heart would start to pump again. Shock after shock my husband stood watching my lifeless body. The medical team tried to get him to leave, but as I said before, my husband is a large strong man and if he doesn’t want to do something no one can make him.
I am glad they couldn’t make him leave. I could feel him mentally calling to me and I to him. I believe if he had left the room that day, I probably would not be alive today. He was saying “don’t leave me”. I heard him and I hung on to that with what strength I had. Our connection has always been strong but I had no idea of its incredible power.
As the team was about to give up, the lead nurse suggested to double up the pads and shock me one more time. They did just that and stood back hoping that would do the trick. My husband said it was like nothing he had ever seen before. It brought me right up off of the stretcher, with limbs fully extended and eyes wide open. After that, as my husband kneeled on the floor beside my lifeless body, trying to find the words to say Good bye, while one technician in background muttered under his breath, “just call it already”. I guess he didn’t realize my husband was on the floor next to me. The Doctor asked for one last check for a pulse. To which the nurse replied, she had a pulse. It was faint and very weak but there was a pulse. This was much to everyone’s surprise and relief!
During this crazy time my husband had to call my mother a second time and told her if she didn’t get there soon, I would be gone. She was working for my brother at the time and she said she was waiting for someone to come and relieve her of her duties, if you can imagine. If I was told my daughter was dying and I needed to go to her, nothing would stop me from leaving immediately. That’s my family for ya.
My mother showed up made a rude comment to my husband and then came over to my side and told me that I needed to pull through this because there were people who were depending on me. I guess she must have meant herself. However, I was still in darkness. She was speaking to my lifeless body that was barely clinging to life and fighting to hang on.
Once a pulse was found, the doctor came to my husband and told him that if I had a fighting chance they needed to transport me to the Saint John Regional Hospital immediately. This hospital has the best cardiac care unit in New Brunswick and if anyone could help me it would be them.
The doctor said that he did not know if I would make the trip but they had to try. My husband wanted to go in the ambulance but there was simply not enough room. A nurse would have to go along with the ambulance crew. He was told he would have to follow along behind and if he had anything to say to me, he better say it now because there was a real good chance that I wouldn’t make it and this could be the last time he would see me alive.
The EMT said if my husband saw them on the highway pulled over to not approach the ambulance, that they would be working on me and they would come to him, it would not be safe for him to approach.
My husband said his good bye to me and we left for Saint John. He quickly gave instructions to his brother on how to get the dogs that were still in the van waiting to be groomed home safe. They would not be groomed on that day after all. I always kept a scheduling book with me that contained all of my customers info in it, thankfully. I am so thankful he was there in our time of need. I am forever grateful!
Once the dog situation was quickly handled my husband grabbed my mother’s car keys and headed to Saint John with her and my mother-in-law on board. He was but couple of minutes behind the ambulance. All the way watching closely in case the ambulance was pulled over on the side of the road.
I was later told that the car ride to Saint John was the most quiet, intense and fast ride any of them had ever had. He said he was so thankful that he never came across the ambulance stopped on the side of the highway. Upon arrival at Saint John Regional, he stopped the car in the middle of all traffic at the entrance, jumped out and sprinted inside to find me, leaving the two mothers to deal with the car and parking..
I woke from a comma about two weeks later…
A lot happened in those two weeks but that part of my story will have to wait for another day.
As Always, With Love,
Tanya Jean