Pinballing Through Memories

Sometimes I dream about lying on the floor feeling the blood run out of me and the moment I realized I was dying.

I remember more than I say and more than I share but can’t say if that will change. Not because it is deeply personal or frightening though both are true.

Ever since that night there are moments where I feel like death is chasing me. In my dream I always turn towards him or it and tell him I am ready to do battle right then and there.

But I rarely turn when I am awake and hear a noise I don’t recognize or feel the bed shift when I am the only one in it and haven’t moved..

Can’t decide if it is fear or I don’t deign to give my attention to it.

But I think upon and about it all and how some of that night reminds me of the ending of Gladiator.

Someone ask me if I was exaggerating when I said I lost almost half my blood and I said if I cared enough to feel the need to prove it I could show my blood test results.

Felt myself grit and half bare my teeth the way my father did sometimes when he was aggravated and wondered how many little things I do are because the little boy I once was watched him so carefully.

Still Anemic?

Two months to the day after the paramedics carried me out of my house I had a physical.

Doc said almost every blood test showed a significant improvement from the year prior and then said I was still anemic and asked if I was aware of any bleeding.

Said no and he said it was minor but still enough to be worthy of getting checked out and then said I didn’t need my BP meds any more.

Hadn’t taken them since the night I was bleeding out so I felt pretty good about all the work I had done to get into better shape. Something must be working if that was the case.

Thought about it at the gym the other day as I pushed through another workout. The clanking of iron piercing the noise cancelling function of the airpods.

Throwing enough iron around to know that somewhere 30 year old Josh is cheering because we’re moving heavy shit again.

Turned on Burn cuz it reminds me of my first apartment and that brings a little adrenaline lift but moved on to a mix of Ozzy and Iron Maiden.

Something about the heavy guitar in Bark at The Moon and El Dorado add to that lift and help me push through that third set.

****

I can feel something sitting in the dark in the back of my mind from that night in October that I can’t quite reach and pull off of the shelf.

Something that chaps my hide a bit and makes me think I need to pull it from the dark into the daylight to see hides under the surface.

I have tried to figure out if I have hidden something frightening or disturbing from that night in October and or the days in the hospital.

So I dive into the memories and replay it all in my head because it feels like if I could reach it I would have more peace of mind.

But I haven’t figured it out. Haven’t decided if maybe it is just part of almost dying and that this is just my mind accepting how close it came.

ER doc was very direct with me about how close I came, paramedics too.

One of the other docs in the hospital said I must be really strong physically and mentally to have pulled myself off of the floor the way I did.

I have to focus on that moment on the bathroom floor where I recognized what was really happening.

You’re Going To Die

I think the events of that night took about three hours from the time things started to go sideways to the moment the paramedics showed up.

In my head parts of it feel like a very brief moment and others feel like days if not longer.

I think about lying in the floor in a pool of my own blood thinking about how very tired I was and surprised by how little pain there was.

Thinking about how a tiny stitch from the surgery must have blown and how bizarre it was that so much blood could pour out so quickly.

Thought about taking a nap and the moment I realized I was unlikely to wake up. And then I thought about just letting go and how I wouldn’t have to worry about retirement or so many other things that felt like irritants.

I am uncertain of how long I considered this option but I obviously changed my mind. Once I decided I was going to live there was no question in mind of doing so.

Survival was a foregone conclusion.

I know reading this might be uncomfortable some people because no one wants to hear I considered dying. But you need to remember this wasn’t a suicide attempt. It was a freak accident, a complication tied to surgery.

When I decided it was time to fight it wasn’t solely because I want to see what my kids do and be around to enjoy life with them.

I have plans. I have goals. I have dreams and I wasn’t ready then or now to give them up.

I might have to go back and reread what I wrote after I was discharged (A Four Day Hospital Adventure) and see if there is a big discrepancy between what I wrote/felt than and now.

In the interim I am pinballing through memories of those days and mapping out where I want 2026 to take me.