“Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” Mark Twain
Hello,
I wanted to write what I can before it all disappears down the Memory Hole.
Collapsed on Jan 19, septic shock from UTI and septic kidney stone. EMT's say BP fell to something like 40. Dead.
Cardiac arrest. And again. And again. Dead, dead, dead.
No bright tunnel of light, no golden escalator with old Fleetwood Mac mix tapes, no exclusive book and movie rights. I even forgot that I'd promised, if I were ever in dramatic straits, to ask for the intercession of Elizabeth Anscombe (1919-2001). A giantess in the field of philosophy and one of God's noblewomen, she just needs a teeny-tiny documentable miracle in order to be beatified. I even blew THAT. I wasn't only nearly dead, I was really most sincerely dead.
Teams of people, however, were darting me with epis and drilling holes in my face, neck and groin to pump in corpse-warmer concoctions faster than my baffled body could tolerate them. They forced the issue, Lord love 'em all. I was on a ventilator for sixteen days.
Prayer groups started double and triple teaming me, which opened up spaces even in the Enemy's territory where grace could operate. Dozens of St Mary's people came tumbling into the Med Center ICU with their hand-knotted rosaries and their Divine Mercy prayers, with sweet trust bordering on obstinacy.
Was it before or after my airway collapsed that a Greek Orthodox priest friend anointed me with sweet oil from a myrrh-bearing icon of St. Anne? Was it before the Two Specialists started staring at the CT and MRI results and muttering “Look at the size of that obstruction. Christ Almighty, what a mess!”--- that my pastor came and gave me the precious Blood of God –- a transfusion from the veins of Jesus Christ Our Lord?
Lord have mercy 12 x. Lord have mercy 40 x. Lord have mercy Women's Plus Size XXL with elastic waistband.
Was it before or after I started hallucinating, that the “Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, Chant-o-Matic” was being dialed up to Max right there in the Med Center atrium? Yes, dearest Baptist friends, Catholics do chant. (And OK, Orthodox buddies, we do mumble.) Anyway, a skeptical world could see how Catholics come fully armed and ready to rumble.
If you're laughing a bit, here's where it stops.
I was given a vision of evil.
I am not writing this because I want you to think, “Oh woo-woo, Mrs Don-o must be holy, she has these Mystical Experiences TM” or even (closer to the truth) “Is there nothing this proud, ignorant, hypocritical woman will not say for 15 minutes of fame?” I haven't the strength in my shaking hands to waste on dubious claims of “God told me,” nor breath in my body to argue about these things, nor (this is the important point) do I understand what I saw. God (!) told (!) me (!), “You're not going to understand but zero-point-one percent of this,” and behold, all-y'all, the fact is, I don't understand it.
I saw evil.
I saw the mouth of evil.
I know that, trembling hands or not, I'll have to explain about the “mouth,” –- though I can't. But I'll try.
It was not large. It was about an inch square, no bigger than a typical chessboard square. It was not a lewd, loose-lipped, lolling Miley Cyrus mouth, nor a thin-lipped Atheist Medical Ethicist mouth with moustache attached, like a cheap movie Mephistopheles.
In fact, there was no face attached. It was a mouth. It had one single snaggle tooth, barbed and recurved on itself like the kind of fish hook that, when the fool fish tries to back off, just digs in deeper. On the tip of the snaggle tooth was a single drop of green venom sufficient, I thought, to destroy life on all inhabited planets.
And the mouth was inside-out.
How you can tell a “mouth” is "inside-out" I do not know, except that it seems I read somewhere about some odious marine parasite that chomps down on some part of its intended victim and then turns itself inside-out, so that the victim is enveloped and slowly digested by the writhing, now-exterior intestines.
Holiness? Heaven? People speak of near-death experiences glowing with consolation and beatitude; my NDE was more involved with Homicide and Hell.
On the way from the CT scan unit to the ICU I had an RN transporting me whom I know only slightly, but who has always been---- shall we say ---- a challenge to my Faith-Hope-Charity. She is brisk, paper-rattling and officious, a sort of pointillist-Catholic as it happens, and I was already running almost bone-dry in the Theological Virtue department.
She got passive-aggressive with me when I was experiencing anguish and terror. She had disputed with me for hours, contemptuously, dismissively, over whether I could have a freaking mouth swab.
Not that I could speak much beyond “ungh, ungh.” But I could point to the mouth swabs which were an inch beyond my reach, and point to my mouth where everything was stuck together like Crazy Glue, and make the classic Praying Hands gesture, and she would say, “You had swab 32 minutes ago, thang Q!” and then walk away.
I couldn't make out her accent but she had evidently was trained someplace where they told her that it is the ultimate in American professional courtesy to end every sentence with “Thank you,” regardless of context. Thus:
“Do NOT bite tongue, thang Q!”
“Do NOT move finger, thang Q!”
“Stop BREATHING, thang Q!”
“You are NOT thirsty. You had swab 44 minutes ago, thang Q!”
He face right next to mine (and she smelled like Citrusy-Fresh Floor Disinfectant) “You are not thirsty. You had swab only 55 minutes ago, thang Q!”
I was left sweltering in my own sour sweat for hours in a claustrophobic underground corridor between the CT unit and the ICU. "Nurse DeeDee" attempted no gesture of consolation, offered nothing, disappeared for hours without explanation, would pop back round the corner with,
“I SAID, Do not bite tongue, thang Q!”
Bad nurse. Nurse Ratched.
Motto: Service to Subhumanity.
DeeDee, Destroyer of Worlds.
If I had a choice between Jesus Christ or a filet knife, I would have chosen the knife. I'm sure I could have done a satisfactory amount of damage with it. If I had a choice between Jesus Christ or pushing this despicable woman through a window, my dying words would have been, “Ah, lovely bloody plate glass.”
Then I saw the Mouth of Evil open up to swallow me and the entire world. And the entire world. And I heard an intense warning:
“Forgive her.”
“I can't, Lord. Can't You see my mind is disintegrating?”
“Forgive her.”
“Are YOU freaking crazy, too? I'm being destroyed by this stupid disease and I'm laying in this stupid lithotomy position at the mercy of this stupid odious DeeDee, my mind is being shattered under the hammer-blows of pain and fear. I can't chose anything, can't calculate anything, can't desire anything ...”
“I didn't say anything about 'Calculate.'”
“I can't forgive her.”
“Of course you can't. Your pulmonary, cardiac and renal functions are failing. Your brain function is disintegrating. YOU can't forgive her. How right you are. Ask Me to forgive her.”
“How long do I have to decide?”
“You moron! There is no more time! Do it now!”
I was well and truly freaked.
“Oh, Dear Lord...?”
“Yes?”
“Dear Lord, forgive DeeDee...”
“And?”
“And wash away her iniquities, or whatever it is You do...”
“And?”
“And don't hold her offenses against her. And help her to become the kind of RN and the kind of good Catholic woman she ought to be.”
There's a whole lot more I could say but I'm already past my 0.1% comprehension and well into the realm of Memory Remodeling and Confabulation (Google it.) Thank you all so much for your prayers. The infected kidney stone? It disappeared. Gone, baby, gone.
Forgive your DeeDee's.
And as for Servant of God Elizabeth Anscombe? Thank you, old girl, thank you.
Thanks for sharing this. What a story on this Holy Saturday where sinful souls are purged before the vision of the Divine Light.
Are you a writer? Man, You SHOULD be! Your post was fantastic! Thank you.
P.S. And I’m glad you’re still with us. :-)!!
Extraordinary.
Thank you.
The thoughts that come to my mind.
The first is the HBO series “True Detective”. IMHO, it was about one thing in the end, “Can Satan exist without God?”
And if Satan does exist then God must also exist.
The other thought is this;
Regina Spektor - “Laughing With”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pxRXP3w-sQ
Thank you Mrs. Don-O for sharing an excellent experience.
I had to laugh as your sharing hit home for me. The Lord works in mysterious ways!!! Sometimes I even wonder if He is a bit sadistic!!
I’ve often referred to my ex-wife as the “Ex-wife from hell.” I swear she has a pin cushion doll with my name on it, made in my image that she gains pleasure skewering. She left me, but took with her huge quantities of anger that are still pointed my direction.
The irony in your comments; “Forgive your DeeDee’s.” That’s my ex-wife’s name!!! It’s a message I keep getting in my prayers. Now He’s even communicating through you. LOL...
Thank you.... and most of all, Thank God.
Thank you for sharing your story, I guess it is time I shared mine.
In 1984 our 18 year old son was broadsided at an intersection and killed instantly. I am sitting in the church waiting for his funeral to begin. I feel a scream welling up inside me as I try to fully comprehend what is going on.
I had been to a funeral a few months ago where a young woman did scream at her fathers funeral and I didn’t want to do that.
I prayed to God to please give me the strength to endure what was before me. Suddenly I felt something brush my head and then my shoulders and my entire body. I felt as if I was wrapped in a down comforter.
I sat quietly and heard nothing and felt nothing, this detached feeling stayed with me for several weeks. My calm demeanor prompted some to say they were surprised that I was able to handle this tragedy so quietly.
Eventually I came out of this state and when i read The Book of Job I realized that this is what was described there.
Happy Easter to you all and He is Risen!
Thank you for sharing your story, I guess it is time I shared mine.
In 1984 our 18 year old son was broadsided at an intersection and killed instantly. I am sitting in the church waiting for his funeral to begin. I feel a scream welling up inside me as I try to fully comprehend what is going on.
I had been to a funeral a few months ago where a young woman did scream at her fathers funeral and I didn’t want to do that.
I prayed to God to please give me the strength to endure what was before me. Suddenly I felt something brush my head and then my shoulders and my entire body. I felt as if I was wrapped in a down comforter.
I sat quietly and heard nothing and felt nothing, this detached feeling stayed with me for several weeks. My calm demeanor prompted some to say they were surprised that I was able to handle this tragedy so quietly.
Eventually I came out of this state and when i read The Book of Job I realized that this is what was described there.
Happy Easter to you all and He is Risen!