looking out of ambulance, ready to go

[mom72]

Sponsor Messages

(eleven years ago) I was having a hard time with asthma, went to the movies, Ever After, with my cousin anyway. Some second-hand smoke in the ticket line outside made my asthma even worse, but I just kept using my inhaler throughout the movie, until as the credits were rolling I was very scared, about to pass out. I don't remember the EMSA man carrying me down from the back row of stadium seating (of course!), but I do remember being carried out through the lobby on a stretcher. I knew people must be staring at me, but I just kept my eyes closed and didn't care, felt the cool breeze outside. At that point, I don't recall feeling anxious or struggling to breathe, just peacefully being aware of the surroundings, and hefted up into the ambulance. Then I remember how pretty the sky was - it was dusky purple, and the street lights, car lights were all pretty white and red. I was looking out through the back window of the ambulance. I sat down, just like I'd sat down on roller coaster rides, and without thinking this was weird at all, my thoughts to myself were - "here I go!" ...sorry, that's all. My next awareness was how nice the nurse smelled, not being able to see anything, and hearing my dad yell that they were going to kill me. It was the next day, I'd been intubated, also with a feeding tube, which my body was abruptly resisting (I was choking on vomit). What they had told my parents was that moments had elapsed after I'd stopped breathing, before intubated, and that if I did pull through, there would likely be brain damage. Well...! I was in and out of it for several hours, and unable to move much for a couple days, but I was severely HAPPY. Just felt like bursting with sunshine! My pulmonologist could not believe I survived. At my follow-up appointment, he just looked at my chart records and shook his head, said he'd never known someone to hit "those numbers" and live. I'm not sure I lived?? I wish I remembered more!

ETA - sorry, about when I "sat down" and thought to myself, "here i go!"... I wasn't seeing out the back window then. It was more like the swirly darkness you see when you close your eyes, a spacious void.

[Indiangirl]

Wow! What an experience! Thank you for sharing. I'm glad you pulled through.

[mom72]

Sure! The best thing about this was that it taught me not to fear death, and hopefully has been some comfort to anyone who has watched someone die. I'm sure my body was struggling to breathe even while (strapped to stretcher with big oxygen mask) on the ambulance, but I was "checked out" by then. And I wasn't thinking anything like, "oh no, my house is messy! I'm not right with God! my cousin is there by herself!" It was just pure blissful aloneness, completely in the moment but anticipating something cool ahead. A smooth transition from real surroundings to out-of-body (not even thinking "hey, I'm out of my body") to ready-for-take-off, lol.

[Zxx]

Sounds like they might have o.d.'d you on morphine.

[Lonely Guy]

Wow, cool a great survivor! glad you become well after all these, and i had some near death accidents which made me so close to deaths! Anyway i pulled through like you! happy life times!