Every year over the past 30 something years I've drawn a cartoon map of the Chef Soiree event, not a big deal, just a drawing of a bunch of cartoon people eating cartoon food listening to good music. It involves three days of intensive drawing, computer graphics and proofreading. But this year I was unable to draw the map, because something stopped me in my tracks. A heart attack.
There's nothing like planning your day out, lining up your drawing sessions, scheduling numerous trips to get the rough draft scanned and digitized, wrapped up with hours of detail work on the computer. Then your chest starts hurting and you realize something is wrong.
At 1:30 p.m. on March 5 I left a meeting at the Youth Service Bureau office (home of the ChefSoiree) with an armful of sketches, lists, and instructions. By the time I had crossed the street and gotten into my car, I noticed that my chest was sore all the way across. Not hurting, just a growing soreness.
As I drove home I began to recognize the situation. There wasn't any pain in the left arm, there wasn't any "elephant sittting on my chest." I kept driving. At the red light at Lee Road and Collins, I sat in traffic mulling it over.
The pain wasn't bad, it would probably just go away after a few minutes. Before I got too far from the hospital however, I thought it would be a good idea to just park for a while and see what the soreness did. I even thought of parking in a nearby church parking lot to wait it out.
But then I thought, well if it is a heart attack, and I died while sitting in my car in the church parking lot, it would look bad for the church. So I decided to turn around and go park in the hospital parking lot and wait it out.
I made a quick U turn in the parking lot of a business on Lee Road. At a moderate speed I drove down Columbia to Jeffferson, then on to 21st Avenue, down to Tyler and southward towards the hospital. No "elephant sitting on my chest" pain yet.
I stopped at a restaurant on Tyler, went inside and splashed some water on my face in the bathroom. I did not look good. Then I got back into my car and drove to the red light at 11th and Tyler and had to wait for what seemed forever to turn left and head for the emergency room parking lot. Luckily, there was one spot open. I pulled in, turned the car off and was just going to sit there and see what happens.
A hospital shuttle bus pulled up behind me and stopped. After a few seconds, I realized the driver was waiting for me to exit the car, so instead of sitting in my car to see if the pain got any worse, I got out, climbed aboard the shuttle and headed for the emergency room entrance. I figured I could just sit in the waiting room.
For some reason I went to the desk instead, told them I had chest pains and gave some indentification. By this time I was hunched over and holding my hand against my chest. They told me to sit down. A few seconds later someone from the back came for me, and I was taken into an initial exam room. Vital signs, an ekg, and quick examination. I was sent back to the waiting room. I started charging my cellphone at one of the charging stations.
Another person then came to get me. This time I was taken all the way into the emergency room, and within a minute I was being prepared for emergency heart surgery. Just before I was wheeled away down the surgical suite corridor, however, a second EKG came back better than the first, and the brakes were put on the "emergency heart surgery" express train. A third EKG a few minutes later came back slightly better.
So within the next three days I underwent the usual battery of tests for heart function and blockages. On Friday another round of chest soreness came and the whole scenario was repeated. This prompted a decision to move me from a regular room to an adult critical care room. Three days later I had heart bypass surgery to open up four blocked arteries.
So the moral of this story is: when it's obvious that something's wrong, don't sit in you car in parking lots to see if it goes away.
