I'M ALIVE

Today is a rather special day. It was one year ago to the day yesterday evening that I suffered my brain aneurysm. It was one year ago today that I woke up alive after surviving the aneurysm and six-hour surgery.

I have never smoked, don’t drink and don’t do drugs – including 420. They call it ‘straight edge’ now, but I was that long before it was given that name.

I often get ridiculed for this and told I am boring. I have a new response to that bullshit, I’m Alive.

So read on for the true tale I call

I’M ALIVE

This tale isn’t about the aneurysm, but is part of that larger story.

Sometime Thursday morning I either woke or was woken by nurses and a doctor. The doctor, David Wilson, told me that I had just came out of six hours of surgery. I don’t remember if I said this to him, or just thought it, but my response was, “What the Hell are you talking about?” At this point I had no memory of the last few hours, and no idea what had happen.

Later that day I was having lunch when Doctor Wilson came to see me. (On a side note, lunch was two slices of pizza and a coke. In a hospital! True!!) Now that I was awake and functional he wanted to go over my vitals and explain to me what happened.

First things first, the aneurysm was the size of a baseball. In my forehead. It was the largest aneurysm he had ever dealt with, and the largest the hospital (Good Samaritan) had ever seen. I shouldn’t have lived long enough to get to the hospital, much less survived the surgery.

Point blank, I shouldn’t be alive. But I am, and he told me it is mostly due to me (Ace), not him or the other doctors who worked on me. Yes, the surgery saved my life, but according to the Doc, my lifestyle allowed me to live.

All my vitals were near perfect, Blood Pressure was good, Cholesterol was good, but my sugar was slightly elevated.

I told him I try to live and eat clean. Also, that I don’t drink, smoke or do drugs.
He answered, “I know. That is the only reason you are alive.”

That floored me.

He told me they did extensive tests and found no trace of alcohol, drugs or nicotine in my blood. Which also meant there were no impurities in my blood that they can cause. This meant the aneurysm went as smoothly as it possibly could.

What does that mean? My blood flowed smoothly and didn’t clog, which would have killed me. It also made it easier on the doctors during surgery. With no impurities to make my blood thick and slow, they were able to drain my brain cavity far easier than they would have been able too. It also made repairing the aneurysm easier.

Point blank, Doctor Wilson told me that if I had been a heavy drinker, or drug addict, I wouldn’t have lived.

Ace Masters