It was November 25th, 2004. Having Turkey dinner with my sister and Brother in law.
It must have been 28 years the last time I had thanksgiving dinner with my sister
Carole. It was just the four of us. Myself and my sweetheart and Carole and Bob. We
have made way too much for just four people. Heck here it is Saturday May 14, 2005,
and I am having mince pie from back then. Having a large freezer can be useful.  
Well we finally got done and we four were so stuffed. There was this last piece of
turkey on the serving platter. I just had to have it. It seemed to have gotten stuck
in my throat and I could not get it out.  
Well as I was going down it seemed I was in water and hands all around me. It was so
peaceful and a good feeling was upon me. Merrill Lee and Bob were giving me CPR and
no way was I leaving anyone at this moment. Finally 4 and half minutes later the
turkey went into my lungs. I seemed to have drawn every bit of air that was in
Merrill Lee. Just then the Paramedics were at the front door. I was whisked off to
Banner Bay wood, ICU.  
The rest has been told to me over and over again. It seems I was in a bad way. Heart
was quitting; brain had no air for four and half minutes. We got kidney failure and
liver stopped working as well. Then we have pneumonia in the right lung.  
Heck I was going septic; all over a piece of turkey. I was put into a medical comma.
I remember nothing from Dec. to the end of January. Had all theses tubes in me with
no hope in sight.  
I went into another part of the hospital to learn how to walk again and finally eat
from my bed. Real hospital food; so good. Yes it was ok  being bland and loved those
powdered eggs with an orange slice that went into the microwave wave along with
everything else. Can you imagine having a cooked orange slice every morning?   
 
It became clear I was on a cardiac diabetic diet. Yes I am now Diabetic. With blood
clouts in my legs. My memory is not to good as well. It never was to begin with. So
now we are a little slower and sleep longer with life outside going on.   
If you cannot tell by now I was in four hospitals. That is all in one Hospital. I
remember very little of the first two. Being ICU and Telemetry. I was sleeping a lot
and having the strangest dreams as well. The last 66 days spent in Select Service
and Rhodes Institute. I really felt that I was staying in the hospital forever.   
The staff had different ideas I found out later.  Rehab had started and my strength
was zero. Nothing was working. But theses amazing people came by everyday and did
not give up. Many weeks later I was using a walker. I had to walk with the walker
everyday, always a little farther. Plus using this oversized wheelchair. I did not
have any muscles at all. They kept on me like strawberry jam sticks to peanut
butter.  
Oh sure I made excuses for I was sleepy, not today. I have a headache, anything to
stop this torrent of good will and love. I did not see it at the time. It was more
than just a job for them. They really cared. Well I was getting around ok and
getting stronger.  February rolled into March. I was finally going home. 

Email  bluebear

My last seizure was back in Ohio, I think sometime around August 1999. I am not really sure. Well the cold weather and high humidity back in Ohio finally got to me besides Merrill Lee.

It is not easy remembering to take your meds, even at this time and date . It is something that I have gotten use to and yet I still forget. I even down loaded a spelling checker so that these thoughts come out kind a clear.

You might say my life started to change when I took a interest in Lee^^. A fellow chatter from tbichat. We have been chatting for the longest time. Except this time, 2000. It was different. I have no idea what made it different. It just was. We joined chat about the same time. I think Merrill was a few months ahead of me on that one.

I pictured this woman in this big house with all this stuff, extra baggage. She was having enough of a hard time without having to deal with so much stuff. Thirty years of marriage and things will add up. I did say things, I had no idea as to how much.

All right we met by using tbichat. Yet we did all our talking to each other using MSN. It was a real romance and still is. Can you imagine two brain dead people taking care of each other. It is funny and very touching as well.

Not only am I still taking Dilantin for a seizure condition. I am taking also Prinival as well. For the right part of my heart. We seem to have a flabby wall here and it is working very slowly. I get this from my Mothers Father, A great man, and wonderful Grandfather.

Do I still have some kind of seizure. Yes, they are the ones where you lose time. Now that is fun, let me tell you. One second you are talking to Lee and the next the ball game is on. I just lost 33 minutes, and that is not fun.

Dilatin still makes me slur my words and I drool at times. But I have been taking this med since I was nine years old. It works for me, others I am told have horrible reaction to it.

So yes Lee did drive to Ohio to be with me. She had this 26 foot trailer and two atv;s sitting on the back of the diesel truck. Then these boxes showed up, my gosh what a sight. I knew right then this woman is serious. We even have a Scottie Dog and a Umbrella Cockatoo.

Yes I fell in love with her sometime ago. It is hard to describe in that a feeling of great happiness came all about me when we chatted. Sure we mailed by snail mail.

You might say my life as changed for the better. Helping in ways that no medication could ever do.

We traveled together back to the west and I would not trade such happiness ever. Seeing some great people along the way.

Living in a 26 foot trailer with Lee and a Scottie dog and a Umbrella cockatoo is a experience that will either break you or make you. We are not kids here, we are both over 50 and yet we did camping to the max.

The snow in December was so neat. Yet the ice around our bed was not cool. It only brought us closer together, yes it was cold and yet we found happiness in the all that we did, and do. In this bigger house is like being in a mansion.

Running hot water, showers that work. We do take to much for granted. You might say Merrill Lee has changed my life. I am much more relaxed and this is good for a brain damaged man like myself. My youngest daughter will be a mother next month. You turn around and you hold on to those memories.

The medical people here suck. They are really back in the dark ages. Getting our meds is like pulling teeth from a shark. We both qualify for the medical assistance programs where are meds are made. Yet to have these medical people do anything about it is insane.

If you find me skipping around it is because I have a hard time keeping one thought. It seems to be a brain thing. Also where are you gonna find a love one that likes the exact same things you do. I mean music, art, tropical fish, rock hunting, people, baseball, reading, cooking, all the sciences, and they have a injured head like yourself.

This truly is amazing and I thank her everyday for being her. Sure we take care of each other, "Did you take your meds yet". "You look very tired lay down and I will finish what you started", This is the way that it is.

Sure we get mad and do dumb things, we are not perfect. Both of our spouses have passed away and we help each other in this way as well. Life is to short and we make the most of it everyday.

You know I have damage to the right side hemisphere of my head that will always be there, The scar in my right temporal lobe will always be there. The dead spots in Merrill Lee's head will always be there. They are a product from a fall and a horrible car accident.

We live with this everyday. Right now we are having a pressure change outside and Lee is having a hard time. I get over tired and then it hits me days later. We will always have these symptoms and we live with them.

Sure it is not easy and we help one another. It is suppose to be this way, at least in this lifetime. We do live a few miles from society and we want it that way. I always say find a map of Arizona and find Mesa Redondo and you have you have found us.

So between the lose of time and times when feet do not work. We are happy and seem to get closer all the time. We help one another and in doing so we are helping ourselves.

To be a Father of six children and they are all grown, the last born July,30,1979. and the first born was October, 17, 1965. Where the heck has time gone, To have 68 calcified scars on the top of your head and many more inside is not what I would suggest for anyone.

The upper right hemisphere of my skull is 95 per cent damaged. I still am amazed that it is the year 2000. My right temporal lobe is buried in bone and many mini fractures. So I am a Father, and yet I am a man that has seizures and has Trauma Brain Injury. Do they mix? You tell me, ; my kids act as if I do not exist.

It is the way it is. Keep on going, even though the medication has ruined my gums, and the medication has left me with a few teeth. Life is really wonderful, so long as you keep it all in persective. No regrets, I know I am more humble because of the fall.

My past is the way I am today. Been this way since I was five years old, First Grand Mal when I turned nine years old. All in all I have a great sense of humor and true I do see many things from a different angle. Add to this that I was hired 47 different times for work. All a different profession.

I do not drive so never have I taken my boys fishing. Or to that special ball game. you know get in the car and just go. I would get into this bus and that bus and transfer one more time and get there. so long as I left two hours before. Been married twice, and finally realized that Richard you have done a few things that should not have been done.

I did not know this was a no no. So what if I had seizures, so what if every three months I had to find a new job. I felt as long as there was bus service there was nothing that I could not do. Yet it has come to me now. I do have a problem here I do have a brain that is damaged.

I am not getting better. Like look in the mirror Richard, you do have a little problem, and it needs to be looked into . So yes I went through heavy denial and ruined two marriages in doing so. No one is perfect. Less of all me.

So here I am a little smarter and a lot heavier. Yet have so many friends, thank you all for being there.

love
Richard Forrest.

In 1949 I had this little fall from a two story balcony. It left my head with a crack inside the skull. Well nothing was really done, I was dying. The swelling took months to go down. From this I know why I am called a fat head. The knitting of the fracture was done by the body itself. Nothing was really done in that the doctors kept telling my dad and mom. He will be out of pain soon. Well seven months later when I woke up, I can remember as if it just happened this horrible headache that I had and man was I hungry. I noticed that my hands would not work and my feet were there. Yeah just there, I wanted to walk , but I felt I was in a dream. Knowing soon I would wake up and be OK. Seeing all these strange people walking around dressed in white; man I was in heaven. I think I was talking and yet no one paid any attention to what I was saying. I can remember this so clearly. The language I was speaking was Spanish. I had forgotten how to speak English. Living in Puerto Rico at the time of the accident might have allot to do with that. I can remember this walker type of thing. It was weird and loud, it made me walk even though I did not want to. My eyes also had the hardest time staying open. Well life goes on, I walked a little better one year later and my head was still sore in spots. My head was never wrapped in a bandage or anything like that. I was bleeding inside, and that stopped too. Never had any operations of any type. So four years later my eyes decide to start working in that walls looked like walls and the sky outside was finally blue. This gray film seemed to have disappeared. But in its place was the first of many Grand Mal seizures. A scar had formed in the right temporal lobe, six thin layers of bone had formed to protect the damaged area. On the right side of my head, from the ear lobe back to the nap of my neck, we have gray and black matter. No real Brain working tissue or nerve endings. It seems from a Scan done at UCLA that Brain cells in this area are no more. Oh well I have always said excess baggage is a pain anyway. So for fifty years I have done well. Life is great and I love life for all it as. So I am missing a few cells, so what. I can keep a secret can you? Love to all who think and feel that they were given a raw deal.look if you have any cells to spare Life is to special to worry about a fat head and "why me GOD." Love you all.

from: bluebear

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