ICU Stay

First off, thank you in advance for everyone that is reading this and following my story.

I left off in the last blog when I went to my local hospital the third time. This is going to be my account of the events that happened to me, but during a huge part of the time I was in a coma. So, I got all this information from friends and family that were there with me the whole time I was dealing with my battle with Lemierre's Syndrome.

I was waiting outside my house in Glen Carbon, IL and my best friend Tim G came to my house to give me a ride to the hospital. I remember driving to the hospital which was only like 10 min. away, but once I got out of his car, I don't remember anything that happened.

Tim was at my work at Big Daddy's drinking when I called him and after he dropped me off, he asked me if I wanted him to come in and I told him not to. So, he went back to the bar. When he got to the bar, he saw another one of my closest friends, Brian. Brian left the bar the minute he heard that I was back in the ER for the third time.

This is the account according to Brian....He came to the hospital and said that we waited in the waiting room for like 3 and a half hours. Then, I was taken back to the ER and saw the doctors. He said that I was only in there for about 15 min before they had me in a gown and they told him that they were taking my by ambulance to Barnes in St. Louis. At that point, he held my hand and asked if I wanted him to go with me and I told him to take my cell phone and wallet and not to worry about me. I would be fine. I asked him to call my dad and my brother in the morning and tell them where I was going. He said okay and by the time that I was in the parking lot. I crashed and I took a helicopter ride to St Louis.

Once in the helicopter, they found out that Barnes ICU was full, so they took me to St. Louis University Hospital. That was on December 16 - the day that my life turned around. As I said before, I don't remember anything from this point on. I have tried to get the story from different friends and family, but it's so hard to talk about.

Well, it is hard to believe that I was at this point - on Life Support.....a lot of people told me that they didn't know what was wrong for five days.....I had a really high fever and I still had the sore throat.

I will never forget all the nurses and the doctors that saved my life in ICU. Doctor Kaplan is the man I want to say that, but I was in a chemical induced coma for ten days in ICU and I finally woke up on Christmas morning...

I could blog about my coma for days, weeks or years about all the dreams and stuff that I remember, The doctor's said the only reason I lived was because of my size. I lost 150 lbs in a month......and a normal-sized person would not have made it. I also put my trust and faith in Jesus Christ. My dad was my best supporter in this. We always haven't had the best relationship, but he was by my side the whole time that I was in the hospital. I ended up staying in ICU for 19 days total.

While I was in ICU, my blood pressure dropped to 60 over 35 and I had a temp of 107.4. I still can't believe it when I hear it from friends and family. The blood pressure medicine they gave me had side effects that caused the blood from my feet to rush to my heart to keep me alive. So, I got a really bad case of gangrene on both feet. They doctors were worried that it would spread to my legs and they said that if the black got any higher they would have to take my legs from the knee down, and thank God, that didn't happen, but I was left with gangrene on both feet.

So, the day finally came when I got out of ICU and went to a normal room. One thing about being in a coma is that I couldn't even lift my head up to eat. I couldn't lift my arms or anything. But, like I said before, my dad was there the whole time to take care of me ,along with my friends and family. One of the main people that helped in my recovery was a great friend named Camille that is a nurse at Children's Hospital. She stayed with me every chance she could.

I really could spend a lot of time telling more about ICU and I will never forget it, but I want to thank everyone that came to see me up there. It was because of all of you that I made it. The nurses and doctors told me that they have never seen family and friends like I had. I'm very lucky, but there will be more to come. Thank you so much for the support.