Remembering Dave - The Importance of Helping the Struggling

 

Ten years ago today was just an ordinary April day. I went out to Best Buy to buy the Foo Fighters new album “Wasting Light”. Today, I would just download it on my apple music app. Ten years ago, I still bought the physical CDs of my favorite bands. I resisted the temptation to open the CD and to start listening to it in the car. I wanted to listen to it from beginning to end in one sitting. I got home and just laid on my bed while listening to it. The final song called “Walk” came on and it was one of those rare songs that I absolutely loved from the first note. I was about a minute into the song when my cell phone rang. It was my mom. I paused the CD player and answered the phone. She said, “Jamison, I have some bad news. Your dad saw Dave's obituary in the Tribune today.” I was absolutely floored.  I hadn't seen Dave in around 15 years. My mind immediately began to speculate on what could have happened. Did he die in combat? The last time I saw him, Dave was still in the Marine Corps. I began to have my doubts as he was 37 years old. Plus, I am sure I would have seen it on the news. Did he get into a car accident? I had no clue so I took to social media but I couldn't find any of his family on there. I was reminded on my Facebook memories today that I asked my Facebook friends ten years ago if they knew anything. Nobody knew a thing.  Now every time I hear the song "Walk", I think of my buddy Dave.  

Have you ever met someone and you immediately clicked with them? It seemed as if you had known them forever? That was Dave and me. We did not meet until our senior year of high school. A mutual friend of ours brought Dave to me and introduced us to each other. We quickly began to hang out all of the time, eat lunch together at school, and we just became very close fast. I invited him to my church for our student ministries, and he quickly assimilated into the group. He would stay at my house a lot. Dave was known for his big laugh and for his ripped physique. He seemed so happy go lucky and I think we clicked because people saw me as being the same way back then. But I began to see that he had some darkness in his past. He would stay the night several nights in a row and my mom would ask “Dave, shouldn't you check in at home?” He would softly comment that “they don't care that I am away from home.” He didn't get into his home life much. I once saw rather large scars on his back and I asked what happened to cause them. He said something about a hardwood floor and splinters going into his back. He wouldn't go any deeper into the subject but I assumed someone dragged him across that floor to cause that kind of damage.

Months passed and we were at our year end banquet for our church youth group. It was early May and we still had over three months to go until he went to boot camp and I went off to college. We were at a banquet hall and it was an emotional night. At that point in my life, I was “too tough to show emotion” and Dave usually had that mindset too. But he was the most emotional out of everybody. He was sitting at the table sobbing and it hit me. I found my place in this youth group a year earlier and now Dave had found his place as well. I sensed he was scared to leave this safe space as I was. But I was heading off to the cushy college life. He was heading off to the military and we had just wrapped up a war in Iraq during the first Gulf War in 1991. Dave finally found some stability in his life and it was ending in a few short months.

Dave gave me these mugs when I left for college. 
They still set on my shelf above my desk.

We spent the rest of the summer together. He basically lived at our house. He was the last person I saw before I left for college in August. He was over my house, along with a few other friends, and we crashed around 5am. I got up at 6:30am and took him home. He was 18 and still didn't have his drivers license. He wasn't in any hurry because he had no access to a car. I dropped him off and we said goodbye. I told him that I would miss him and I would be praying for him during boot camp. I made sure I gave him my mailing information for college so we could write each other. This was before email and cell phones. I then drove home and my parents and I headed off to Ashland University for my freshman orientation.  Dave came to visit me at college a couple of times. We saw each other in 1995 and we met his wife, stepdaughter and son. He got to meet my girlfriend Lisa, who is now my wife. We never saw him again.

In the years leading up to his death, the Lord would put his name on my heart and in my mind. I tried and tried to locate him with no luck. I just sensed that he was in trouble and that he needed me. But I just couldn't find him.  I searched and searched for him and his family on social media with no luck.  I used databases to try and locate him.  I knew his full name and birthdate but still had no luck.  I was even tempted to hire someone to try and locate him.  Then the phone call came from my mom.

The obituary said that there was a get together to remember Dave at his older sister's house. I met her a few times in high school but didn't really know her. I went that afternoon along with my wife, sister, and brother in law. We were the only ones there. Dave's sister had old pictures of Dave along with newer photos. I finally asked, “I hope I am not being too forward, but could you tell me how Dave died and what he was up to in his final years?” She looked at me and said, “It isn't a problem at all. Dave took his own life. He left his family years ago, moved to Florida and on March 27^th, shot himself. His friend found him after a few days. I don't understand why he did it and I was surprised he left his dogs uncared for. He loved those dogs.”

She confirmed the feeling I had deep in my gut.... that Dave killed himself. My mind began to race and I was thinking about his last night. I was consumed with how must pain he must have been in and how desperate he must have been to make that choice. My heart was broken. We stayed at my parents house that night and in the middle of the night, while my wife slept next to me, I sobbed.  I wish I had just located him! I would have dropped everything and flown down to be with him. I felt so guilty and it sent me into my own tailspin. I too was struggling with depression at that time. There was even a point where I thought my wife and kids would be better off without me. I even had a plan together in my mind on how to end my own life. It would have been a lot less dramatic, but it would have ended with the same result.

I keep reading about how so many people are struggling with mental illness with this pandemic. I have read articles about how elementary school kids are taking their own lives and it blows my mind. We, as a society, have really struggled with community in the last several decades. We used to know our neighbors. We used to have people over from our churches. Well, most of us used to actually go to church. The majority of our country has now stopped going. We are lost in our own world that basically revolves around our cell phones, tablets, social media, and TV streaming platforms. I am guilty of it as well. We are focused on consuming content while the people around us continue their downward spiral.

At one point, I lived in severe pain all day, every day. I lived on narcotic painkillers, nerve pain medication and muscle relaxers. Once we moved to Pittsburgh, we struggled to find a church where anybody gave a rip about us. I was drowning in chronic pain and depression and Lisa was drowning as the breadwinner and as a caregiver and nobody seemed to care. I am guessing Dave felt the same way.  We have to peel our eyes off of our devices and start looking around for people we can help.

I couldn't decide whether to make this blog post about mental health or the importance of community. I guess I am hitting both of them. If you are struggling with mental illness, get help. It doesn't have the stigma attached to it as it once did. Find a professional to talk with. Also, share your pain with someone else. I wish Dave would have shared his pain with me. But he had too much pride. I doubt I could have done much to help him when I was 17 but I would have made sure I found someone who could. He suffered in silence. I would have done anything for him.  If you are struggling with mental illness, please do not consider suicide.  It may end your pain but it creates an extraordinary amount of pain for those you leave behind.  They will second guess themselves the rest of their lives.  It will do unspeakable damage to those who love you.  

I encourage you to keep an eye out for people who are struggling. There are many Daves out there. Sometimes they just need to know that someone cares. I know I needed that for years. We would go to church, sit through the service, and then walk out without anybody talking to us for years. Nobody cared that we were there. I am thankful that the Lord ended up leading us to a small church in 2013 where people just loved us. Healing took place there. It was just what we needed and I only wish we would have found it sooner.

I would have loved to have included pictures of Dave and me but I wanted to honor his privacy. It is also why I did not include his last name. I wish I could have helped you Dave. I will always love you brother.

The Waiting is the Hardest Part

Tom Petty said it best when he wrote “the waiting is the hardest part”.  I went into 2020 with high hopes for a fresh start in my life. I transitioned out of student ministry in 2018 with the plan of becoming a lead pastor or an associate pastor with a focus on small group ministry and/or discipleship. I had a job offer in late 2018 but turned it down so my daughter could finish high school where we have lived for 15 years. Then my life was turned upside down when I had a STEMI heart attack, two years ago today, on February 1, 2019. I spent the rest of 2019 rehabbing and dealing with some other issues that came out of that event. 

Going into 2020, I had my plan constructed. In the spring, I would get licensed once again in the denomination where I am ordained as a pastor. I would then look for a position in the summer after my daughter graduated. There is an old Yiddish proverb that says “Man Plans, God laughs”.  Some believe it is taken from Proverbs 19:21 which reads, “You can make many plans, but the Lord’s purpose will prevail.”

The new normal.  Mask life. 

I know I’m not alone when I say that the last year has not gone as planned. COVID completely altered most of our lives. My heart disease makes me high risk and my cardiologists have told me that I would not fare well with COVID. They want me to basically quarantine and don’t even want me to attend church in person until this entire ordeal is over. We have been extremely careful and I have done next to nothing during the last 11 months.  I was in the maintenance program in my cardiac rehab and that was shut down last March. I miss it dearly. We have a membership at the YMCA but I am not chancing getting COVID there.  I have seen how poorly people clean the equipment when working out there.  Our family has done church online for the better part of a year. We attended church in person for several weeks in August.  We deliberately attended the 8am service so the sanctuary would be completely sanitized and it is the service with the fewest people. We sat in the back by ourselves.  After about three weeks, the virus spiked again so we went back to church online. I didn’t dream that we would still be dealing with all of this after 11 months. But COVID isn’t the only reason I have had to wait. 

I miss church.  I have to either watch on my Ipad or we watch on our TV. 

It was early August 2020 and I was making progress in preparing my body for the grind of full-time ministry. I started intermittent fasting at the end of June, had lost 12 lbs, and was working out 6 days a week. With cardiac rehab and the YMCA not being an option, I started my own simple workout plan.  I did at least 30 minutes of cardio 6 days a week and lifted weights every other day.  It was simple but it was working.  However, I noticed when I exercised that I would get a severe headache that would last the rest of the day. I saw my cardiologist for a follow up appointment and my blood pressure was sky high. The doctor put me on a blood pressure medication. It didn’t help at all. They doubled the dose and it still didn’t bring it down. A few weeks later, they added a second medication. It also didn’t help. They doubled the dose of that medication and that combination started to control it. I didn’t get it. I was eating better and eating less. I was losing weight again and working out constantly.  My blood pressure had been near perfect. It was extremely frustrating. 

In the middle of the blood pressure ordeal, I started feeling very fatigued. I was also light-headed and short of breath when I exerted myself. In addition to all of that, I started having chest pain and pain in my left arm. I felt exactly like I did before my heart attack.  I ended up having another heart catheterization. The doctors didn’t want to mess around with a stress test with my history. I had the procedure 4 months ago and everything looked great. My heart looked great, the stent that was inserted two years ago today looked great, and the blockages in my arteries had actually decreased. I had mixed emotions. I was very thankful that the situation with my heart looked good and that my hard work had paid off. But I still had no answers. Why do I feel like I do?

Waiting to go in to get my heart cath

In October 2019, while spending over a week in the hospital, I found out that my heart was going out of rhythm when exercising. The doctors thought that the scarring on my heart from the heart attack was likely causing it. My new electrophysiologist put me on a very strong medication that made me feel lousy. A few months ago, we decided that he would wean me off of it and we would try another medication. I still do not feel great and have no firm answers. Ask anyone who really knows me and they will tell you that patience has never been my strong suit. However, I have found that it is during these trying times that we have the opportunity to grow the most. 

I don’t understand why this is all happening. All I want to do is go back to work, provide for my family, and serve the Lord with the gifts He has blessed me with. To say I miss preaching and teaching would be the understatement of the century.  I miss the adrenaline that pumped through my body when I was getting to ready to speak and I really miss sensing God speaking through me.  I miss sitting across from someone over breakfast or lunch and ministering to them.  God has called me to be a pastor and I believe that with all of my heart.  I have a huge void in my life without it. It is my calling and I cannot picture myself doing anything else. But I am also realizing that it may look different than I have envisioned. The waiting truly is the hardest part. But during this down time I am allowing God to make changes in my life and I will continue to trust in His timing. 

Are you in a season of waiting like I am? I leave you with a couple of verses from the Bible. 

“Be still in the presence of the Lord, and wait patiently for him to act.” Psalms 37:7

“Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord.”

Psalms‬ ‭27:14‬ ‭

David wrote these psalms while going through very difficult times. He was being hunted down by King Saul and his men. People close to David were betraying him. Others were urging David to just kill Saul so he could step into his place and become king. Scripture tells us that David had opportunities to take Saul's life so he could take the throne.  But David chose to wait on God’s timing and to completely trust in Him. I choose to do the same. God eventually did make David the king of Israel and I trust that He will place me where He wants me.  It doesn’t necessarily make trusting easy but I have to remind myself that God is still on the throne. He is in complete control and I will trust in His timing over mine. I have encountered a few situations in my life where I was very disappointed about not getting a particular position and now that I look back, I see that God was protecting me from a difficult situation or drama that I did not need in my life.  My future is in a much better place when it is in God's hands and not in mine.  

The Origin of Finish Strong

On March 29th, 2019, eight weeks after my heart attack, I began Cardiac Rehab.  I met with my new nurse Mark in a conference room and we reviewed notes from the cardiologist and he explained what happened that fateful night.  He said that shoveling snow in my driveway likely caused a piece of plaque to break off, blocking the right coronary artery 100%.  He explained that they would start me off slow because my heart had damage from the heart attack.  There was likely some permanent damage and there was also damage that could be temporary.  However, if I pushed too hard, that temporary damage could become permanent.  This stuck in my head as I began because I have a tendency to push way too hard when I am just starting back up in the gym.

I have to admit that I was anxious heading into rehab.  In the weeks leading up to rehab, I walked the hills in my neighborhood.  Those walks helped build some confidence.  I was no longer short of breath as I had been prior my heart attack.  I just kept telling myself that I would be wearing a heart monitor and I had experts watching me closely. After the consultation was over, Mark took me to the treadmill.  He told me to go 3 mph for 15 minutes with no incline.  It seemed very slow to me but I did what Mark told me to do.  It helped that he could see how fast I was going on the monitor he watched.  I knew he would come over and tell me to slow it down if I went faster than told.  I finished up my time on the treadmill with no issues and it seemed very easy.  Mark then took me to the Nustep machine.  I was very familiar with this machine because I loved using it when I went to an 8 week chronic pain rehab program in 2007.  Most gyms do not have this machine and I hadn’t used it in 12 years.  He put the machine on level 4 (out of 10) and told me to do 15 minutes.  I had no issues.  Again, it seemed easy.  However, with two minutes left, the phrase “Finish Strong” popped in my head.  I hadn't thought of it for years.  So where did this phrase come from?  I can vividly remember the moment it entered my life 29 years earlier on a football field.  My mind immediately took me back to the summer of 1990. 

My Cardiac Rehab facility at Shadyside Hospital

I always wanted to play football growing up.  My dad played football in high school and college and he also coached football at my high school in the 1970’s.  I have had a love for the game since I was a little boy.  When I was in elementary school, many of my friends played for the “Little Eagles” pee-wee football team and I wanted to be a “Little Eagle” badly.  My friends on the team walked around in their blue “Little Eagles” jackets and I really wanted one to wear one of them.  I would beg my dad to play.  He would always reply, “a boy’s body isn’t ready for contact football until they are in junior high.”  He never budged from that stance. So I had to set my sights on starting my football career in 7th grade at Turner Junior High.  The problem, when that time came, was that I was about 4’6. I joined the team but I was just too small to get much playing time.  Our team dominated week in and week out leading to a 7-0 record and I would run onto the field to play left guard during the last few minutes of each game.  Discouraged about my size and seeing that my playing time wouldn’t change until I grew, I stopped playing after that season.  I didn’t get my big growth spurt until the summer before 11th grade.  However, by the time I grew, it was too late to play my junior year. 

My parents and me on the field of Mollenkopf Stadium before one my dad’s games.  

 

Warren, Ohio was a football town and we had two large public high schools in the city.  Both played Division I football, which is for the biggest schools in the state.  Both high schools in the city had won state championships in football.  The Warren City School system was millions of dollars in debt and they decided during my junior year (1989-1990) that they would consolidate the two schools starting my senior year (1990-1991).  The football coach from the other high school, Warren Western Reserve, was named the head coach for consolidated school.  Coach Phil Annarella came over to my high school, Warren G. Harding, one December afternoon.  An announcement came over the PA system that any boy interested in playing football the following school year could miss 8th period to attend the informational meeting.  I was all about getting out of class so I headed down to the meeting.  As I sat in the auditorium and listened to Coach Annarella talk about playing for him, my attitude changed from “I am sitting here to get out of class” to “I would run through a wall for this man.”  He was not a "rah rah" coach but I could tell that he was genuine, cared about his players, was full of class and that he was a winner.  I decided that afternoon that I was playing football my senior year. 

Coach Annarella holding the State Championship Trophy at our parade in downtown Warren.  Sadly, Coach passed away suddenly last summer.  He will always have my admiration. 

My parents had reserved a condo down at North Myrtle Beach for a week during the summer of 1990 before I made this decision to play.  Well, it just so happened that the first week of summer conditioning was the week we were scheduled to go to South Carolina.  I attended after school conditioning from January through May so I knew the coaches pretty well at this point.  I talked to a few of them and told them my dilemma.  Do I stay home and miss out on vacation for football or do I go to the beach and miss the first week of summer conditioning?  They told me to go to the beach and to not neglect my conditioning while I was there.  So I went to the beach and spent time running and doing other exercises.  I worked out in the weight room at the condo complex and made up some drills that I did in the ocean when the undertow was strong.  We came home from the beach on a Saturday night and my first practice was on Monday evening. I had missed four nights of practice. 

We wrapped up my first practice and one of the coaches came up to me and said, “Jenkins, you owe me 32 gassers for missing last week!”  I replied, “Um, what is a gasser?”  Some of my teammates, who were close by, just chuckled and muttered, “oh man, this is going to suck for you.”  So what is a gasser?  You stand on one sideline of the practice field.  The coach blows the whistle and you run across the field (53 yards) to the other sideline, run back to where you started and then do it again.  Four trips across the field for a total of 212 yards equals one gasser.  You had to complete each gasser in 45 seconds.  Now factor in the heat and humidity of an early July day while wearing a black football helmet along with your practice jersey and shoulder pads.  Anybody who was thinking straight knew it was not going to be easy.  However, my thinking was, "OK, no problem."  It is funny how you think you are invincible when you are 16 years old.  Once all my teammates went into the varsity house, the coach told me, “I’ll tell you what. Give me 8 gassers tonight and then 8 gassers on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and we will be square.”  I looked him in the eye and said, “Coach, if its OK with you, I want to run all 32 tonight.”  I will never forget the look on his face.  He gave this half grin, kind of rolled his eyes and shrugged his shoulders and said, “OK, if that’s what you want…”  He put his whistle in his mouth, turned around, and shook his head in disbelief.

So why in the world did I tell him that I wanted to run all 32 gassers that night?  One reason was ego.  I had the attitude of "I am going to show these guys that I am a tough guy."  Another reason was that I wanted to impress them.  I was going to be in a dogfight for playing time.  After all, I was essentially a rookie as a senior in high school.  My dad, a former football coach at this point, warned me that I would have to really stand out to have a shot.  We just combined two football powerhouses into one team.  I had to grab the attention of my coaches in any way I could.   I was hoping this would do the trick. 

Coach lines me up on the sideline and blows his whistle.  I take off.  I am mapping out a strategy in my head as I run. “I can average 11 seconds with every trip across this field.  I have to pace myself since I just committed to running across this field 128 times.  Wait, did I just say 128 TIMES?!?  I cannot burn myself out quickly.”  The coach is shouting out when I hit 20 seconds and then 40 seconds.  If I am cutting it close, he counts down from 5 to 1 after he yells 40.  “40 seconds, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1”.  I finish the first 3 gassers and I am thinking to myself “This isn’t too bad. I’ve got this. No problem.”  Around gasser number 8, my legs are getting a little heavy and I am having some pain in my ribs.  About 12 gassers in, I start having my doubts. The voice in my head says, "Wow, I may have made a mistake. This is getting tough."  About 18 gassers in, I am yelling at myself in my head.  “You idiot! Your big mouth just wrote a check that your legs and lungs aren’t going to be able to cash.”  At this point, I am slowing down. I would yell, “time coach?”  and he would tell me how many seconds I had when I asked.  He quit announcing the time when I was 20 and 40 seconds in around gasser 10.  I hit the 24th gasser and I know that there is no way I am finishing them in 45 seconds.  On my last time across the field for that gasser, I yelled “Time coach?” He chuckled and said, “Man, I quit looking at the stopwatch a couple of gassers ago.  I am just impressed that you are still upright!”  By this time, I am really feeling it.  My legs feel like concrete.  Let me remind you that I had just finished a 3 hour practice and ran the most grueling running drill we did as a team called “4 Corners” at the end of our practice.  It was after all of this that I committed to 32 gassers.  Yes, I realize I made a completely moronic decision.  Around gasser 26, I just feel like quitting.  My brain, legs and lungs are screaming at me to just stop and tell the coach that I would do the rest of them tomorrow night.  But my pride wouldn’t let me.  This is when that phrase first came into my head.  FINISH STRONG.  It became my mantra.  I kept just telling myself over and over in my head, “FINISH STRONG, FINISH STRONG, FINISH STRONG!”  I was struggling to breathe and that pain in my ribs was really intense at this point.  My legs felt like stone pillars.  I was a sweaty mess.  I was fantasizing about drinking some cold water as soon as I got into the varsity house and then drinking about two gallons of ice-cold grape Kool Aid when I got home.  The thoughts of keeping my time were completely gone.  My only focus at this point was just completing the task at hand.  However, on my last gasser, I made the decision that I was going to go as hard as I possibly could.  It probably did not look very fast but I dug deep and ran as fast and as hard as I possibly could.  

My football picture taken a few weeks after summer conditioning started.

I managed to finish them.  It had to be around 9pm and it was almost dark at that point.  I can still visualize the pink sky on the horizon as I finished.  The two coaches, who were lying on tackling dummies while I was running, made a big deal about me finishing.  Both of them chatted most of the time I was running and I wasn’t even sure they were paying attention during the second half of my self-imposed ordeal.  But they were recalling specific times when they thought I was going to quit.  They could tell I was struggling and they were shocked that I pulled it off.  What I set out to accomplish happened.  Several other coaches pulled me aside the next night to compliment me for gutting it out and running all 32 gassers.  The defensive coordinator said it made a real statement to them.  I guess the coaches who supervised my running went into the coaches room afterward to tell them that this nutcase named Jenkins ran 32 gassers at one time.  I think they knew that I was serious about making an impact on this team.  

So now, 29 years later, I sit on the Nustep machine surrounded by senior citizens after suffering a very significant heart attack.  I was determined to finish strong.  I am not just talking about these 15 minutes on the Nustep on the first day of rehab but in my recovery in general.  I knew I was going to have some down days in my recovery.  Would I get myself off of the mat and dust myself off to fight another day or would I just take the easy way out and quit?  As I was preparing to start rehab, I read a statistic that only 1 out of 5 people who suffer a heart attack will complete cardiac rehab.  Most will not even go.  Some will go but will not finish.  But I also read in the same article that if you finish cardiac rehab, your chances of having another heart attack go down significantly.  It was going to be a big commitment.  I had to drive 45 minutes just to get to the hospital down in Pittsburgh.  Traffic is terrible in this city.  My ride home was over an hour with people coming home from work.  But I was committed to completing cardiac rehab just like I was committed to running those 32 gassers after saying that I would.

I completed the program on June 28th, 2019.  As Mark was going through my discharge papers with me, he said, “because of your hard work, commitment and dedication, we want to offer you to continue coming as part of the maintenance program for free.”  I was prepared to say goodbye that day and I was sad about it.  I love the nurses there and got to know many of the participants.  I even had an opportunity to minister to some of them.  We knew that they had the maintenance program for $40 a month but we could not afford it on top of the cost of gas and parking.  My wife Lisa came with me on my last day and I went over told her that I could keep coming to rehab for free and she started crying.  We were extremely grateful for the opportunity to continue.  I am still going to the maintenance program.  Sure, I have had a few hiccups.  I suffered a significant concussion last summer and missed a few weeks to recover.  My heart was going out of rhythm in October and I was hospitalized for 8 days.   After being discharged, I had to put the heart monitor back on and cut back on my exercise routine.  Before my concussion, I was working out almost three hours per session.  I am still not back to going hard for three hours.  In November, I got bronchitis which lasted for 9 weeks.  But when I got to the point where I could breathe again, I resumed.  Now rehab is temporarily closed due to COVID-19.  But I am working out nearly every day at home by walking around the neighborhood and using bands for strength training.  I can’t quit working out as my life is riding on this.

Posing with the shirt they gave me upon completion of Cardiac Rehab

I encourage you to finish strong in whatever you do.  If you are battling a physical issue, finish strong.  You can’t go back and change what has happened in the past but you can make changes today and commit to finishing strong.  If you battle mental illness, commit to getting help.  Finish strong.  It applies to our faith as well.  We got wrist bands made that say, “FINISH STRONG” on them.  On the back of the band, I decided to put “2 Timothy 4:7” on it.  The Bible verse reads, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race and I have remained faithful.”  The author, the Apostle Paul, was sitting in a jail cell waiting to be executed when he wrote this letter to his protege Timothy.  Timothy was a young pastor who was dealing with difficult circumstances in his church.  Even when Paul was in jail, he was ministering to others.  Paul was telling Timothy that the end of his life was near, that he had fought the good fight, he had finished the race and that he remained faithful.  He was encouraging Timothy to do the same.  My relationship with Christ is the most important thing to me.  Those who follow Christ are engaged in a spiritual battle and that battle can get us down.  Life is not easy.  I am determined to fight the good fight and to finish the race strong; physically, mentally and spiritually.  I am committed to remaining faithful.  Fight the good fight.  Finish the race.  Remain faithful.  We only get one life.  Commit to finishing it strong. 

The Day That Changed My Life

My life was turned upside down one year ago on February 1, 2019.  I hadn’t felt well for about 6 weeks and noticed it for the first time a few days before Christmas when I changed the brakes on my wife’s car.  Every time I stood up from squatting down, my head would spin.  I just had a bad ear infection the month before and assumed it had returned.  The symptoms really spiked on Christmas Eve.  I had very little energy to go with the dizziness.  On Christmas Day, I got off of my in-laws couch and got so dizzy that I fell back onto it.  I called my ENT and got in a few days later.  She said my ears were clear but that she wanted to do blood work.  A nurse called back a week later to tell me I had mono.  How could I have mono when I had it in college?  The nurse said it matched my symptoms and it was showing up in my blood.  I saw a doctor in my family practice a week later and she did not think it was mono.  She suspected a sinus infection.  I told her I had no pain in my sinus cavity or teeth like I did with the numerous sinus infections I had previously.  She wanted me to get a CT Scan of my sinuses and take an antibiotic.  I did neither.  Hoping it was mono, I just rested as much as I could.  Two weeks later, I got in with my actual primary physician.  He said it was not mono.  It was showing up on my blood test because I had it when I was younger.  He also suspected a sinus infection but did order more blood work to see if it was something else.  Three days later and still waiting for the results of the blood work, the calendar read February 1st.  

We had an unexpected snowstorm that morning.  My wife usually has a 25 minute commute to work.  This particular Friday, because of a surprising three inches of snow, the commute was 90 minutes.  The time in traffic disrupted her entire day.  I spent the day on the couch feeling completely exhausted.  Every time I got up, my head would spin.  Lisa called me around 3pm and said that she was coming home early but she was stopping at the grocery store first.  We still had snow in the driveway so I pulled myself off of the couch, bundled up, and headed outside to shovel the sidewalk and driveway so we didn’t have to deal with the snow when she got home with the groceries.  It was around 15 degrees and I was outside in a couple of hoodies and shorts. I shoveled most of the drive and was doing fine.  The snow was pretty light until I got to the bottom of the driveway where it mixed with the salt on the road.  I finished up the job by picking up that heavy snow and I lost my breath.  In 2017, I had suffered with bronchitis and struggled breathing for almost 5 months.  In 2018, I battled pneumonia.  I was also told I had allergy induced asthma.  Assuming that that was what was causing my shortness of breath, I went into the house, got into bed and used my inhalers.  It helped some but not completely.  I also had a dull ache in my left shoulder.  It started all settling down and then Lisa came home.  Not wanting Lisa to carry in the groceries herself, I went outside and put about six grocery bags in each hand like I always do.  I carried them in and then the proverbial crap hit the fan.  I couldn’t breathe again and now the shoulder pain was very intense.  I laid back down and there was no improvement.  In fact, it kept getting worse.  I have had a great deal of pain in my life.  In college and in my 20’s, I had 20 kidney stones.  I lived with severe back pain for years and years.  Other than a couple of my kidney stones, this was the worst pain I had experienced.  I couldn’t get comfortable or find any relief.  We tried heating pads and ice.  Nothing worked.  I was sweating and very hot so I went into the basement where it was cooler.  I sat on my chair with no relief.  I got up and moved to the couch with no relief.  I couldn’t sit still because the pain was so bad.  It felt like somebody was driving a knife into my shoulder blade.  I was back in my chair when the pain traveled down my left arm.  I took two painkillers that I had left over from my tonsillectomy in 2016.  Next, I got a vicious headache.  It felt like my head was going to blow off of my shoulders.  Lisa came down and asked if she should call 911.  I told her no.  I don’t remember this, but Lisa said I held the top of my head and screamed “I don’t know what’s happening to me!!”  Again, she wanted to call 911.  I refused.  I thought I probably just pinched a nerve in my neck shoveling the snow.  Lisa said I started sweating profusely and was very clammy.  Now she was calling 911 no matter what I said.  

As we were waiting for the paramedics to arrive, I was scrambling around, gathering my chargers and other “necessities” for my trip to the hospital.  I also changed my clothes while Lisa was yelling at me to sit down and wait.  About 5 minutes after she called, the paramedics arrived.  They assessed me on the couch and said they thought I pinched a nerve in my neck.  Lisa thought to herself, “Jamison is going to kill me.”  The EMTs asked if I could walk to the ambulance.  Trying to be a tough guy, I said yes.  They had me lie on the gurney in the back of the ambulance and did an EKG.  I saw the look the one EMT gave to the driver and I knew it wasn’t good.  She looked at me and said, “Sir, you are having a heart attack”.  I couldn’t believe it.  I felt a few tears come out of my left eye.  The EMT wiped them away and said that I should be ok because she thought we caught it early.  I told her that I wasn’t afraid to die because I actually look forward to going to heaven but that I wasn’t ready to leave my family.  I want to see my kids finish school.  I want to be a grandfather someday. As I laid there on the gurney, I prayed to God saying, “Lord, You have brought me through too much for my life to end like this.”  The EMT did another EKG and it confirmed that I was indeed having a heart attack.  She took my blood pressure and it was down to 60/40.  I was in excruciating pain and I couldn’t sit still.  She apologized that she couldn’t give me anything for the pain because any pain medication would kill me due to my blood pressure being so low. The EMT asked which hospital I wanted to go to.  I said we have UPMC insurance so take me to UPMC East in Monroeville.  She said, “Sir, if I take you to East, they don’t have the capability to deal with this.  They will look you over and send you to Presby in Oakland.  You won’t survive to see Presby.  We need to take you to Forbes.”  I am thinking to myself, “why did you bother asking then?!?”

Lisa was sitting in the car behind the ambulance wondering what was taking so long.  The driver walked up to her window and told her, “Your husband is having a heart attack.  We are going to Forbes with sirens and lights.  DO NOT try to keep up with us.”  We started flying to the hospital.  What would usually take 15-20 minutes took only 7 minutes.  Before we even came to a complete stop in the hospital parking lot, the back doors flew open and a large crew of people raced me into the Emergency Department.  8 doctors and nurses were waiting for me in the ER bay and they went to work.  They wanted to cut off my favorite shorts and Steelers pullover but I insisted that I take them off.  I told them they don’t make them anymore so I could not replace them.  The one nurse just shook her head in disbelief.  They got me semi-stabilized and were able to give me morphine for the pain.  It didn’t help one bit.  A few minutes later, they gave me Dilaudid and it also did nothing.  A few minutes after that they gave me Fentanyl.  It didn’t touch the pain.  The nurses informed me that I was fortunate because the cardiac team was still at the hospital this late on a Friday evening.  They had just finished working on someone else when I was ready to go into the catherization lab.  I asked if they would knock me out to do the catherization and the nurses told me I wouldn’t remember it.  My dad said he never remembered his procedures.  They gave me another medication to put me in a twilight state.  It didn’t touch the pain and didn’t knock me out.  

I remember every detail of my heart catherization.  The cardiologist said they would normally go through my wrist but since time was so critical and the room was still set up from the last patient, they were going through my groin.  I remember feeling the pressure when they cut me open.  I saw some of my blood squirt up on the cardiologist.  The nurses were trying to get my mind off of the procedure by asking me questions.  I knew the trick they were employing to distract me but I just answered their questions.  One nurse asked, “What do you do for a living?”  I answered, “I am a pastor”.  They jokingly said to put in a good word for them with my boss.  The cardiologist did inform me that if he could not get the stent in, we would be doing emergency open heart surgery.  I began earnestly praying that God would guide the cardiologist and that the stent would go in.  They worked on me for a little while and the pain disappeared instantly.  Dr. Dua, my brand new cardiologist, got the stent in.  He informed me that my right coronary artery was 100% blocked and that I was very fortunate to still be alive.  He walked out and told Lisa that “the timing was everything”.  A few more minutes and I probably wouldn’t have survived and if I had, I would have had a badly damaged heart.  They took me up to the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit where I would spend the next two nights.

Being wheeled out of the catherization lab.

After everyone went home, I laid in that hospital bed trying to process what had just happened.  Did I really just come close to dying?  How did this happen?  I was only 45 years old!  I talked with numerous doctors and nurses that weekend and they all asked me if I was a heavy smoker.  I told them that I’ve smoked one cigarette in my entire life when I was 14 years old.  Most of my friends smoked and I stole one of my dad’s cigarettes, climbed up into the loft of the small barn on the back of our property, and smoked it.  It was disgusting and I never touched another cigarette in my life.  They asked if I was a heavy drinker.  I told them I could count the number of alcoholic drinks I have consumed on both hands and that I hadn’t had any in over 13 years.  They asked if I had family members with heart problems.  My paternal grandmother had a number of heart issues including open heart surgery.  My dad had four stents put in but he was a smoker for almost 50 years.  They said that the cause of my heart attack was likely genetics and that if I had smoked or drank alcohol, it likely would’ve happened years earlier. 

In my hospital room the next day.

The morning of February 3^rd, a lady came in early and did an echocardiogram.  She could not believe how little damage was done to my heart.  She also warned me to not shovel snow again and that I probably shouldn’t mow grass either.  I begged the cardiologist to let me go home on that Sunday so I could watch the Super Bowl in my basement and not on a tiny TV in the hospital.  I was doing better than he expected, so he let me go home.  Instead of the pizza and wings I planned on eating for the big game, I had a bowl of unsalted almonds.  Talk about a big letdown.  But this was the beginning of my new life. 

Walking out of the hospital.

Coming within a few minutes of my demise has most certainly been a wake-up call.  I went to cardio rehab, which I will get into in future posts, and finished it.  I have been going to the maintenance program since early July 2019.  I have exercised more since my heart attack than I have since I played football.  I am not on a strict diet but do much better than I did.  I have lowered my A1C by a full point and am no longer considered pre-diabetic.  I have lost a lot of fat and gained quite a bit of muscle.  I struggled with my sleep for about two months after my heart attack.  I would get a little anxious with every twinge in my chest or ache in my shoulder.  Once I started cardiac rehab, I began to sleep much better.  In October, my heart went out of rhythm.  During my first stress test at the hospital, I came close to going into cardiac arrest.  The next day, I was back in the heart catherization lab.  Everything looked good and the blockage in my widowmaker actually decreased from the time of my heart attack 8 months earlier. The cardiologist credited my diet changes and hard work at cardiac rehab for the improvement.

After a workout at cardiac rehab 5 months later.

I am so thankful to be alive.  I have never appreciated life as much as I do now.  I don’t let the small stuff bother me anymore.  Life is too short to get worked up over petty things.  Lisa and I look back at the events of that day.  I am so fortunate that it worked out the way it did.  Had we not had that snow, Lisa would have come home at her normal time and she likely would have found me dead.  I am confident that I would have been too stubborn to call 911. If Lisa would have listened to me and not called 911, I likely would have died. If the EMTs would have taken me to the hospital that my insurance covered, I likely would have not made it.  If the catherization team was not already at the hospital working on another emergency, my life likely would have ended that night.  I am so thankful that Lisa did not listen to me and called 911 (I know she will hold that over my head for the rest of my life!).  I am thankful that God had His hand on me and worked everything out. He is not done with me yet in this life.  

As Lisa has posted many times on social media, “let our wake-up call be your wake-up call.”  Make it a priority to exercise at least three times a week.  Make some adjustments to your diet.  If you smoke, quit.  I have had no less than ten medical professionals assume that I was a heavy smoker.  It is what usually causes these catastrophic heart attacks.  Finally, pay attention to what medical issues run in your family.  If your family members have battled heart disease, you need to take this seriously.  Let our wake-up call be your wake-up call!


Please Note:  Not all heart attack symptoms are the same.  This from Mayo Clinic:

Common heart attack signs and symptoms include:

• Pressure, tightness, pain, or a squeezing or aching sensation in your chest or arms that may spread to your neck, jaw or back
• Nausea, indigestion, heartburn or abdominal pain
• Shortness of breath
• Cold sweat
• Fatigue
• Lightheadedness or sudden dizziness

Heart attack symptoms vary

Not all people who have heart attacks have the same symptoms or have the same severity of symptoms. Some people have mild pain; others have more severe pain. Some people have no symptoms; for others, the first sign may be sudden cardiac arrest. However, the more signs and symptoms you have, the greater the likelihood you're having a heart attack.

Some heart attacks strike suddenly, but many people have warning signs and symptoms hours, days or weeks in advance. The earliest warning might be recurrent chest pain or pressure (angina) that's triggered by exertion and relieved by rest. Angina is caused by a temporary decrease in blood flow to the heart.

When to see a doctor

Act immediately. Some people wait too long because they don't recognize the important signs and symptoms. Take these steps: