Death’s Door
By: Dr. Mike Gora
As my wife Bonnie and I came away from the front door of a local steak house where we had dinner with our friends Kathy and Joe on August 15th my iPhone called me to attention. I noticed then that I had missed two earlier calls from my daughter Robin as I picked up her third call.
“Its Matt,” she said, in a breaking voice, referring to my son, her brother, “He’s in the ICU, he might not make it, you better come.”
Matt the 42-year-old, married with two darling girls had mysteriously collapsed in his car while in a shopping center parking lot at 10:30 a.m., after making a small credit card purchase, only to be found five hours later comatose, with the car and air conditioner running.
No planes to Atlanta were available until 6:45 in the morning of the 16th and, of course, I was on it. My daughter, Matt and their mother have lived in Atlanta where they moved after my break up with their mother years ago.
As I turned the corner to Matt’s room I was greeted by daughter and daughter-in-law, Angie, with a group hug and anguished tears. Little had changed since I had talked to my daughter the night before.
I entered his room where his mother greeted me with a look and a sigh that needed no explanation. We had long since put our grievances aside for the sake of the children and ourselves.
Matt was comatose, on a ventilator, attached to typical and unique machines, which kept his pulse rate, blood pressure, breath rate, and monitored his IV solutions, all of which I had seen before. Uniquely, he was being slowly frozen from the neck down in an attempt to force warm oxygenated blood to his brain in hopes of saving him.
Over the next few days tests were administered and good and bad were revealed by the team of physicians charged with saving Matthew’s life. “Matt’s brain stem was alive,” which made his recovery possible, but, “Matt had been with no oxygen for up to ten minutes.” Any longer and he would have died before he reached the hospital. A doctor agreed that it was amazing that he had been in his car for hours, but only lacked oxygen for less than ten minutes before he was found and given oxygen by the paramedics.
The freezing process was later reversed, returning temperature to normal after several tedious and frightening hours. Throughout the time we talked to him, held his hand and beseeched him to squeeze our hand if he had heard us. After hours I thought I felt a slight response but was afraid it was my wish, not his command.
Sister caught a real squeeze an hour later. A nurse suggested he wiggle his toes and he did. I had called my friend Howie, a neurologist in Plantation and reported the events. He suggested that there was hope because of the responses.
Matt was stable and kept alive by the ventilator. His doctors predicted a long haul if there was to be a recovery with physical, mental and emotional therapy, but first he had to somehow silently teach himself to breathe on his own. Things stayed the same…until the following Tuesday.
I had returned to Boca Raton with a promise to fly back on a moment’s notice. First my daughter texted me with the news that Matt had been off the “vent” for an hour, and later on Tuesday that he had been taken off entirely, and hopefully forever. And, when asked his name, responded “Matt.” He identified his two daughters and a cousin he had not seen for years.
By the time that I returned to the Hospital on the 24th Matt was able to communicate with a head shake or nod. His wife, mother or sister had taken turns staying in his room with him overnight. I suggested that they take the night off and let me sub.
We watch some NASCAR from Bristol together. I helped him with some breathing exercises, and we both dozed on and off between his treatments. By Sunday Matt was reading the headlines in the local paper and seemed saddened by the passing of Neil Armstrong.
Two weeks out and Matt is no longer in ICU and is on his feet with the help of the hospital’s physical therapists.
Matt has a long way to go, but I think that none of it would have been possible without the help of his wife, mother, sister and the professional staff of doctors, nurses, and technicians at Gwinnett Medical Center.
Oh yes, and the prayers of his family, many friends and many others of all religions and races who are connected with our family. God bless you all.
Michael H. Gora, Boca Raton divorce lawyer, has been certified by the Board of Specialization of The Florida Bar as a specialist in family and matrimonial law, and is a partner with Shapiro Blasi Wasserman & Gora P.A. in Boca Raton. Questions may be submitted to Mr. Gora atmhgora@sbwlawfirm.com.
