Mike's Story
DECEMBER 7TH, 2014 STARTED OFF LIKE ANY OTHER DAY.
My son and I went hunting in the morning and I had taken my wife to dinner later that evening. I felt great, until around 2 o’clock in the morning when I woke up to use the restroom and passed out from a major seizure. 9-1-1 was called and I was rushed to a nearby hospital, but later transferred to a larger, better equipped one via Care Flight Mobile.
I spent the next 10 days unresponsive, and in a coma. The situation was extremely dire and there was little hope to be had. It was to the point where the medical staff began to mention the possibility of organ donation. But guess what? I defied the odds and woke up! I am still here – alive and well! (Clearly, because I’m typing this!)
Three weeks went by before I was transferred to an inpatient rehabilitation facility where I had to work my tail-end off every single day. I couldn’t walk and I couldn’t sit up, but by the grace of God, I could talk and my memory was still intact. The nurse asked me what my goals were as she wrote them down on the white board in my room. I told her that while I may have arrived on a stretcher, I was going to walk out of that facility on my own two feet.
I TOLD HER THAT WHILE I MAY HAVE ARRIVED ON A STRETCHER, I WAS GOING TO WALK OUT OF THAT FACILITY ON MY OWN TWO FEET!
On February 6th of the following year, I was finally dismissed and able to go home for the first time in 61 days. While I did manage to walk out of the hospital, I had to rely on a wheelchair to get around for the first few weeks. In addition, I had to rely on the help of my family for the first few weeks as well. When I came home I couldn’t tie my shoes, button my shirt, write my name, or even roll over in bed without help
Looking back on it, the whole ordeal I went through was very strange. I did not have a stroke but my symptoms were stroke-like.
When I first came out of the coma I couldn’t move, not even to scratch my nose. Eventually I could move my right side but suffered paralysis on my left side for many more months. My diagnosis went from a possible stroke to cerebral vasculitis to ADEM to even leukemia.
They finally settled on encephalitis, in layman’s terms, it was an infection that traveled directly to my brain causing severe inflammation; possibly from a bug bite but I’m thankful every day that it wasn’t any more severe than it already was.
