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Bob's StoryI was working in Denton Texas starting a machine that this company there had purchased from my employer, I figured I was going to get to fly home on Christmas day; I had flown home on Thanksgiving day on the previous job I had just completed in this same factory. Thursday 12/20/07 at about 3:30 pm the machine, which was set up to draw down copper rod to 14 awg size wire, had a wire break while we were running the machine at 8,350 feet per minute. I felt my chest get struck with a piece of wire, this happens from time to time and a scratch with a little bit of blood is the normal amount of damage that occurs. My right hand went immediately to my chest when I felt the sting, I saw that my shirt had a rip in it and blood was beginning to soak the shirt from the wound visible through the hole. In my head I was keeping a fear at bay that I was seriously injured, I wanted to evaluate the injury but I was too afraid to do so being a person who takes the site of my own blood not very well. With my hand over the wound I carried a conversation with another person who was standing near me, after roughly 20 seconds I pulled my hand away from the torn shirt and now the conversation turned to you got hurt. I believe I purposely had removed my hand since I was still afraid to examine the wound and figured I should at least let someone else know I was hurt. Close to a minute after being struck I began to feel dizzy, believing I was going to pass out I lay down so as not to fall down and bang my head. During this time I was scared to death but kept voicing I'll be ok somewhat in part to try to convince myself that there was no reason to panic, the bad part of me doing this is others heard this and since I was chanting this some people believed what I was saying. Lucky for me 911 was called by another person who assessed the condition of me bleeding lying down and disregarded what I was saying. I tried to sit up once when I thought the dizziness was passing but with-in a few seconds I had to again lay back down because my head began to spin again. During those few seconds I was sitting up I twisted to get a look at the cement where I had lay down to see if I could see blood there wondering if perhaps something had actually gone totally through me, though I reminded myself I would not know if that would be a good or bad sign, there was no blood on the cement. Next I remember a contractor who was working on the same machine as I was keeping cold compresses on my forehead, shortly thereafter I remember seeing the EMT's. I realized at this point my breathing was very shallow, so shallow that had it gotten any shallower I would have been gasping for enough breath. The emt's quickly deduced I needed to be transported by Life star to the Dallas hospital; as they carried me out of the factory I could hear the woop, woop, woop of the helicopter. They then told me we are putting you in the helicopter to get you to the Dallas hospital instead of using the local hospital. My thoughts here were very mixed, I must be in very bad shape to be going in the Life Star helicopter but at the same time feeling relieved that I now was in professional care who would examine my wound and whatever was found would be able to deal with it. Twice during the helicopter ride I was asked if I wanted anything for the pain, I declined both times because I was scared that I would go to inhale and would not be able to and if this occurred I wanted to be able to think my last thoughts without being in a drug frenzy. Twice during this entire experience I allowed my subconscious worst thoughts to enter my consciousness, here in the helicopter I quietly said goodbye to my sons and their spouses incase the worst was to happen. In the trauma center they determined my heart had fluid around it and they wanted to do a cat scan. I remember answering no to "do you smoke, do you drink, do you take illegal drugs; these three no's I thought helped swing the scales of justice back to a neutral position from the slow continuous drop that had begun from the time of my accident. My memories of my time in the trauma center is nothing short of fabulous; the team of people doing tests while also telling me what and why things were being done did a lot to ease my nervousness. I remember a nurse there who was named T, my daughter-in-law back in Ct is an RN who I nicknamed T shortly after getting to know her, lying there in Dallas having this connection to home/family was something I grabbed hold of and held tight to. After the cat scan was over, the head of surgery told me I have good news and bad news, the good news is there is nothing wrong with your lungs, the bad news is there is a piece of wire stuck in your heart and in the next hour you will be in the operating room having open heart surgery; I was very scared even though he did his best to relax me by informing me that I was in one of the best hospitals to have this type of surgery and my circumstances gave them the time needed to have a specialist prep to do the operation. I had not and still would not give any phone numbers for them to call for the hospital to have as an emergency contact; I kept saying wait until I'm out of surgery then call my kids. Why call them up and tell them what was happening only to make them go through the misery of waiting for the results all the time I spend in the operating room. The surgeon who was going to operate on me, met me and he told me "look, we do not know what we are going to find once we open you up, you may not come out of this, you may have to go onto bypass (which I had an idea what this meant but was not sure), we need an emergency phone number we can call if we need to once we begin operating". I gave them my daughter-in-law's name, T, and job position (RN and at which hospital) she worked since I do not have phone numbers memorized and told them my son Derek is her husband, I remember now crying believing I could really die. I remember only little things from now until I was out of surgery. I remember waking up in the ICU and being told it was a very short and good surgery, miraculously no damage was done to my heart as the wire pierced into it and stopped in the left ventricle; I've got the piece of wire from the OR surgeon the next morning. This surgeon told me I am so lucky that my heart was not damaged with this happening was unbelievable, that by less then 2 millimeters it missed one of 3 things in the heart that had it struck the helicopter ride would have taken to long to save me. I tribute this surgeon along with who helped him in the operating room, the team in the trauma center, and the emt at the factory with my being alive. I was lucky to be so close to such a great hospital with a heart specialists at the ready. When I was ready to fly home to Ct., I had to buy myself a Dallas Cowboys t-shirt at DFW airport just because I wanted a shirt with the city name DALLAS written on it, funny but this was very important to me. I flew home on Christmas day and saw my sons and their spouses that night. It is now two weeks later and I still some nights as I also did in the hospital wake up in the middle of the night and have to convince myself that what I've just told you is the events just as they occurred. In the darkness of the night I believe I am no longer alive, that I'm hanging in limbo somewhere, and the events that I've described is what my mind has fantasized has happened, it usually takes a few minutes and I calm down enough to dispel these thoughts and go back to sleep. The irony I see later in the morning is that I was so successful convincing myself I was not hurt bad to keep myself calm immediately after being hit in the chest that in the darkness of the night my mind wanders to thoughts of are you still lying, spinning a tale that all went well because you cannot yet accept how the real events unfolded? As more days go by it is easier to dismiss these thoughts when I wake in the middle of the night, I'm sure in my future I will look back on these days and have a good laugh at how real these thoughts had once seemed. As long as I'm speculating on my future lets make it vacationing on a caribbean white sand beach with all my sons and their wives/girlfriends with me and we will be toasting to good times and good memories, soon my subconscious will see these are the thoughts to wake to in the middle of the night because this is where my reality lays. Bob You are here: Home >> Your Stories >> Bob's Story |
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