The Car Accident that saved my life |
On January 20th 2001
I was involved in a car accident that left me with 21 broken bones and 27 days in a coma. I managed to get crushed by my beloved 1960 Thunderbird.
Here is what happened:
I went out to start my car, it wouldn’t start
so I opened the hood and jumped the starter solenoid to start her up.
Then the transmission popped out of park and into reverse. The car then
proceeded to move down my driveway into the street, I jumped across the hood
and tried to get into the drivers window to stop the car.. Well..
The window was closed and I couldn’t
get into the car.. so I had
to choose to either ride the car into the street and hopefully hit the neighbor’s fence OR try to jump out of the way as I was
hanging on the side of the car (would probably have gotten run over by a front
tire if I tried to jump).. So, I chose to ride it out.. and to my surprise the car turned abruptly when it
got to the street (the curb made the tire turn), And then swung wide and caught
me in-between the T-Bird’s door
and the side door of a car parked across the street.. Well.. I heard a thud..
And thought it was my car hitting the one across the street.. But in actuality it was the sound of my body being
caught between the cars..
Next thing I know, I’m on the
street on my back, I can’t
breathe well and I can’t call
for help. I find that I cannot stand up.. So I lay there and rock back and forth hoping
someone will see me in the middle of the street.. WELL..
A guy in a pickup truck keeps driving by asking me if I need help (of course I can't
respond to him). Finally he (or someone else, I never found out) finally called
for an Ambulance,, the EMT
folks cut my clothes off and I was able to at least whisper my name and my
brother’s phone #. I remember
that ride to the hospital was the most painful event of my life ever (to that
point.. more pain
later). I passed out as they pushed me into
It seems they decided to put me in a chemical coma after 4 and half days of trying to stabilize me due to the fact that I had broken my 9 left ribs in 17 places... And couple other minor breaks. And they decided that I wouldn’t survive surgery they decided to have my ribs heal themselves while I was comatose. Please bear with me; I have very little memories of that period of time. When I awoke I found that they had put me on the patch (I evidently was rather aggressive as I went through withdrawal from my nicotine addiction and kicked a nurse while comatose).. I have since remained nicotine free (and I broke my caffeine addiction as well) for almost 3 years... (No I won’t be changing the rules, but I will be adding addendums later)...
Here is an addendum... when they woke me up I felt there was a local drug lord that wanted me killed and he hired a medical doctor hit man to take me out.. At that point I was positive that they were trying to kill me (I was on some serious drugs and the paranoia was powerful)... So I tried to escape from my hospital bed... I pulled all my tubes out (which were many) including that thing in my throat... I then pulled my broken up body out of the bed and proceeded to fall on the floor and rebroke my collar bone and broke another 2 ribs... (I was just a bag of fun for those poor folks at the hospital). Well... a really big intern put me back in the bed and made me promise not to do that anymore or they would tie me down again.. .. Well I promised I wouldn't do that anymore... and then I healed some more.
A couple of months after the accident I returned home. I think my cat thought I had left for good and apparently didn’t miss me a bit (harrumph) I proceeded to spend the next 10 months trying to recover. During that time my musician friends had a benefit for me and raised enough cash to pay for my physical therapy on my frozen shoulder... (I am forever grateful to so many people)... WELL it seems I was not healing fast enough… so my Doctor sent me for a stress test... I failed… then they did some other thing that didn’t feel good putting probes to my heart via arteries) WELL I woke up... they said hummm... your getting a triple bypass at 5am tomorrow morning... go back to sleep
On January 9th 2002
I had triple bypass surgery<>
Looks like President Clinton decided to be a copy cat .. but I got mine first PS.. I am all healed now, I just don’t smoke anymore and I walk alot (miles every day) I only drink coffee in the mornings and it's usually decaf (yeah I know, you all think I'm nuts) I sold my motorcycle and ride a bicycle now. I sold the Thunderbird yesterday.. and I'm sad. But it's a new day and time for me to enjoy my Volvo Convertable. (really, it was cause the seats are good for my back) I’m still single.. But I just don't date smokers anymore.. (took a coma to get me to stop, can't take a chance on starting again) And I’m finally losing all that weight I found while sitting here for 2 years
34 lbs down as of Oct 8 th 2004 25 more to go!
SO.. the moral of this story is
… If I had not crushed myself with the car, I would not have gotten
health insurance which afforded me to get a stress test (costs too much if you
don’t have insurance) and I would not have found out about the blockage in
my heart and I would not have gotten the bypass and I would have died on feb 9th 2002 in my
sleep during an event that my heart speeded up . But due to the wonderful work they did at
Alexandria Hospital, I survived it easily and they did a little diddy to me so that it
wouldn’t happen again (I forget what the procedure was called but they
used AM radio waves to kill some sort of extra trigger in my heart that I was
born with).
SO…. LOVE
and LIVE LIFE….. IT DOESN’T LAST FOREVER
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
-à Update January 21st 2005 ß-
Well
here it is, 4 years since the accident, I have to admit that being near moving
automobiles makes me a bit nervous on the anniversary date but I can live with
it.. Some of
the changes in my lifestyle have taken hold and it looks like I’m
destined to be a non-smoker (I was
worried there for the first couple of years , afraid I might fall back into my
old nicotine drug addiction habits).. but no longer, I
am comfortable with having killed any desire to smoke. SO for all you smokers out there… Coma’s
are good for breaking the addiction.. now the problem would be how to get a coma…
I
am so happy to have finished my music CD project and released it May 2004, you
can of course buy it at CDBbaby.com/calanbyrd
(they have 2 minute soundbites of all the songs).. and you ITunes folks can download the songs one at a time.. Now if
I could only find a manager and get someone to distribute the music other than
out of my car trunk..
Life
is good, life is short, please don’t put off the good things in life.. it’s better to put off the
bad stuff .. Please treat everyday like it’s your last… one day you
will be correct..
Did
I mention that I have wonderful family, friends and neighbors for without whom
I would not have survived this
55 lbs down as of Feb 8 th 2008 15 more to go!