The Day My Body Betrayed Me

The crowd was silent.

All you could hear was the buzz of anticipation as the bull fighter stood perfectly still. He steadied his red cape and prepared to begin his dance. Slow graceful steps followed as he waited for the bull to proceed in what it wanted to do.

Destroy his opponent.

The bull took short fierce breaths as he stared at the matador with intent eyes - preparing to strike. One hoof pawed the ground and he surged forward.

And so the dance began.

Advances and retreats in the most elegant display of battle ensued. They moved like two lovers dancing the tango.

The final move built like a crescendo in an orchestral performance. The matador taunted and shook his cape at his enemy. The bull responded - hooves hit the ground like roaring thunder. The bullfighter swirled in a balletic move worthy of a famous dancer, avoiding the daggers of the bull’s horns for the final time.

The bull, missing - ran to the end of the arena.

The matador bowed to the praise of the crowd. Gifts and flowers of reward were showered like rain from heaven.

The bull circled the arena, for him the fight was not over. The dance had not yet concluded. He still had a few steps he wanted to take to complete their routine. The thump of his hooves once again hit the ground as he gained momentum. The wranglers missed their chance to lasso the bull and put him back into his pen.

Everything moved in slow motion. The sudden gasp from the crowd, the bull running full force, and the matador turning to meet his enemy once again, seemed to play out all at once.

Fear for the first time flashed in his eyes as he prepared to make his final move to save himself…

Suddenly, the fighter was Evelyn.

She stood there not knowing whether to run or hide, but the bull was coming fast. She had to do something, but she didn’t know what to do.

How did she get into this situation? How was she going to fight a bull? This was crazy? The bull charged as though he found it perfectly sane.

She was going to die! There was no way around it. He was getting closer. She stood trembling with a cape of glory that was about to be her cape of death.

This couldn’t be happening!” She thought to herself.

She felt faint.

Her alarm snapped her out of her dream like a bell of mercy, and she sat up in her bed panicked and gasping for air like a drown victim.

Evelyn took several calming breathes as she sat upright.

Why would she dream of a matador and a bull?

Thank God it was just a dream!

The fact that she saw herself as the matador in the end was even more comical. Why would she taunt and fight that poor animal? If she were in the arena, the best she could do was try to pet it and coo soothing words. Surely it would reciprocate by ripping her apart!

She smiled to herself as she got up to face another day.

She welcomed the warm shower that greeted her before she walked back to her bedroom.

Evelyn had been so tired lately, but there were things to do. There was no time to slow down.

Since her dad’s illness, she had to stop her career and step in to take care of him. Her mom was in her 70’s and not able to handle the burden alone.

He was suffering from Alzheimer’s but to him, he could still conquer the world. She had to constantly watch him as he would find hidden car keys in a fit of independence and think he could drive himself to appointments. It was all she could do to hide them or chase behind him like a detective looking for a fugitive.

Alzheimer’s was such a debilitating disease, with many stages, but there were brief moments when the mind becomes clear and the person thinks they can outsmart you with the acumen of a trained agent.

She knew it was hard for him to feel himself lose who he was. But it was also hard for the family to see the decline as well. To see someone you love and look up to for strength and protection - turn into someone you didn’t recognize, was tragic.

She tried her best to keep her mom from feeling the brunt of the stress.

Cora, a Home Health Aide, helped a few hours a day, but the majority of the time Evelyn was responsible for her dad’s care and seeing after her mom.

Her father had been strong and caring and full of wisdom, and she felt there was no hero on the silver screen or in a book that could be greater than him. She still felt that way.

After her father’s passing earlier that year, she noticed her mom’s health declined as well. It was more mental than physical, but grief can make the body deteriorate just like an illness. They had enjoyed over 40 years of marriage. Though her mother tried to put on a brave face, Evelyn knew she was heartbroken.

It had been a very emotional and exhausting time…

She looked at the clock.

Her appointment was at 8:30 a.m.

She only had time for tea which she made quickly and sprinted up the stairs feeling breathless and a little dizzy.

“Whoa, she said holding onto the banister at the top of the stairs.

She didn’t have time for this.

Whatever was wrong, her body had never let her down before. She would be fine.

She was sure of it.

She walked to her closet slipping on her blouse. She buttoned her skirt and bent down to put on her high heeled boots. She zipped them into place and stood up.

Suddenly, all hell broke loose.

She felt like she was trapped in a tunnel or a dream. Everything felt foggy or fuzzy, she didn’t know how to describe it. She tried to breathe, but her lungs wouldn’t cooperate. They must have had a synchronized friendship because suddenly her heart wouldn’t work either, or rather it was working too fast. She froze and tried to keep herself calm. She was just tired and needed to slow down a little. That must be it! Everything was going to be ok!

She stumbled forward willing her breathing to pick up and her heart to slow down. Both were acting like two stubborn children. Neither would obey and were acting out of control.

Her heart was running with the force and speed of the charging bull she had dreamed about that morning. Just like the matador felt helpless to stop the charging rage coming towards him, so did she.

“God, Help me!” She prayed.

If she could just open the door and call Cora…

She turned to do so and all went black….

“Wake up.” Evelyn heard those two words with the clarity of a loud speaker. Her eyes popped open in obedience as though they were on cue.

She was in bed. She tried to lift her head and succeeded for the most part, until her head plopped back down and she began to feel how weak she was.

Where was she?

She tried sitting up again which was really difficult, but she eventually succeeded.

She was alone and in a hospital room.

Did the bull actually get her? She thought with a weak smile just as a doctor came through the door.

He introduced himself as Dr. Rosen, informing her that she had fainted and the ambulance brought her there.

Cora must have found her.

“What was the last thing you remembered happening?”

She told him about her weakness and fatigue, the stress she had been under, her racing heart, and the dizzy spells she had been experiencing.

“So it is not my iron levels? I’m a little anemic.”

“No, your iron is not the problem. We ran a series of tests.”

He explained that she had a saddle pulmonary embolism, which was a large clot that looked like it came from deep vein thrombosis in her left leg and had traveled to her vital organs.

They had her on blood thinners through the IV, but she was in critical condition. They needed to decide what steps they were going to take because the clot could move again at any moment, and if that was the case, she needed to prepare herself.

Was he kidding? She felt fine outside of feeling a little weak, and she felt surprisingly calm. She didn’t feel like she could die at any moment.

She guessed this was her charging bull.

They decided on the least invasive procedure to see if that would work. They would run a tube through her neck and administer the blood thinner directly into the clot. Hopefully that would make it break up like an exploding meteor. With a clot this big, they weren’t too hopeful, but somehow she knew everything would be alright…

Six months later, Evelyn was doing fine.

It took a while to get past the anxiety as clots, even on blood thinners, could come back unexpectedly. She sporadically experienced heart palpitations and shortness of breath, which understandably made her nervous that it was happening again. But she worked through it; she didn’t let her fears get the best of her.

She took it one day at a time. She had diligently taken her medicine while learning the healing properties of eating more green leafy vegetables and including natural blood thinners like garlic supplements and drinking clove tea.

She eventually, after the test showed she had healed, made the decision to come off of the thinners as they were causing side effects.

It was almost a year now and she was doing great.

She realized that is was not so much that her body had betrayed her, but that she had refused to listen to her body's signals telling her it needed help.

She learned that in being a caregiver you also have to give some care to yourself. Learning how to delegate and ask for help was not a weakness, but a skill in being strong.

As she lay in bed trying to go to sleep, she thought of how funny life could be and how it could throw problems at you at the speed of light.

She wasn’t sure how she got through this, but she knew her faith was a big part of it. She learned that no matter how many things you may feel you need to do, if you don’t take time to care for yourself, you won’t be there to be productive anyway.

She also learned that events in life are unexpected, and no matter how strong you are, some of them will catch you off guard. Don’t allow fear to paralyze you. Push forward and take it day by day. She found strength in herself during her illness that she didn’t see while she was well.

She slipped into sleep and found herself back in her dream that she had a year before.

She saw herself turning at the moment the bull was about to strike. She was the matador, and she was not afraid.

The bull bent his head in a forceful attempt to take her down. Instead of feeling the fear that she had first experienced, she found her courage.

She grabbed him by the horns wrestling him to the ground as if she had the strength of a thousand men. The bull dropped to its knees until the wranglers came to lasso him and put him in his pen.

The crowd went wild…

She smiled in her sleep remembering that age old idiom, and she finally knew the full meaning of her dream, when life rages against you, “Grab the Bull by its Horns!”