Trying to get back in the habit of picking up my life again. On the evening of February 26, I came back in from walking and told Karen that I had a pain in my chest and she needed to call for Teague Emergency Services and while on the phone I collapsed on the floor. Within a minute first responders were there and worked for 5 minutes to get a pulse, made a last attempt with the electric paddles, got a faint spark and rushed out the door with a loaded gurney to an idling helicopter for the flight across the dark Central Texas Sky to Baylor in Waco. As they left the lead responder told Karen he was not optimistic.
At Baylor the heart surgery team, after completing a pacemaker implant, was out in the parking lot heading home when the call came that a critical heart patient was on a flight coming in and they scrambled back to the operating room to prepare. Karen arrived and he told her that I had only a 10% chance of survival but having received training in a major metropolitan hospital he inserted an impeller in the center of my heart to take over its function while he cleared blockages and installed stents. Shortly he raised his prediction to 25% survival rate and a few hours later declared that he thought I was going to make it.
We all search for answers to the unexplainable, but to me this was a night when God simply said “it’s not over until I say it’s over”.
