I’ve always been one for dates, for anniversaries of events. And for me there aren’t many more significant anniversaries than today. Twenty-six years ago on this date my mother took me to the hospital and saved my life.
I was living on my own in a small apartment in Chestnut Hill. I got sick on Wednesday with what we thought was the flu—fever and vomiting. My sister had had the same thing the week before. My friend the nurse who lived one floor above me wasn’t that concerned.
When I wasn’t any better by Saturday my mother came to stay with me. On Sunday my legs broke out in large purple blotches. That’s when they took me to the hospital.
You know how you dread going to the ER because you might have a long wait if your problem isn’t that serious? The staff took one look at me and I got bumped to the head of the line. What service! (A bp of 60/40 will do that . . .)
After an argument during my exam with one doctor about whether or not this was an ectopic pregnancy (I knew full well it wasn’t), they prepped me for exploratory surgery. I hyperventilated in the OR and they actually gave me a paper bag to breathe into.
A wonderful medical team operated on me. My surgeon, Dr. John Roberts, normally wouldn’t have been in the hospital that day, but through some odd circumstances, he was. Someone sitting in her own bedroom had been shot—hit by a bullet that came through her bedroom wall from outside.
After surgery, Dr. Roberts told my mother I would live or die in the next 36 hours. Needless to say, I survived. They estimated that my appendix had burst on Thursday, leading to severe peritonitis.
A week in ICU, a month in the hospital, fantastic residents and students and nurses at the hospital (I was someone’s case study!), more surgery, many antibiotics, brief return to the hospital, long recovery, lifetime impact.
It was my own George Bailey moment—so much around me that has happened since wouldn’t have if I had gone the other way in those 36 hours. And 26 years later, I know I should never forget that.
