Now it can be told. The story you are about to read is absolutely true…detailed exactly as I remember it.
Part I
It was exactly five months ago—August 25, 2016. I had checked into the JW Marriot in midtown Indianapolis the evening before and was excited about speaking to a national organization of civil engineers that morning. At approximately 8:30am, I was leaving the concierge lounge with a bowl of granola, blueberries and a glass of milk. My intention was to eat while finishing some computer work, shower, dress, and head downstairs to speak. I was to meet the event coordinator in the hotel lobby at 11.
I never made it.
While waiting for the elevator with my cereal in hand, I paused to admire the view from the thirty-first floor. There had been a game in Lucas Oil Stadium the night before and I could see activity far below as the grounds crew tidied up outside the home of the NFL’s Colts.
I vaguely remember turning just before I felt the blow. The angle was not enough, however, to see my assailant. In the previous instant, I had considered myself completely alone and unobserved. Around the hallway corner and tucked into the elevator alcove, I was no longer able to see the lounge from which I had just exited. Neither was anyone there able to see me.
Apparently, a baseball bat was the attacker’s first weapon of choice for a massive swing connected with my lower back and drove me into the wall. There, attempting to remain upright, I was repeatedly stabbed—again apparently—with a butcher styled carving knife. Though the onslaught was quick and brutal, I remain oddly ashamed to admit that I never even turned to defend myself. Instead, I collapsed helplessly to the floor.
Notice, if you will, that in regard to the weapons used by my attackers, I have now used the modifier “apparently” two separate times. In relating this event as accurately as I am able, “apparently” is the only word that fits the situation. “By all accounts…” won’t work because there weren’t any others. “So I am told…” would be untrue because I wasn’t. Not a single witness came forward.
As a crime scene, the elevator alcove was as free of physical evidence as could have been possible under the circumstances. No weapons were left behind. Neither were there unidentified fingerprints or clothing fibers. DNA—beyond my own—was nonexistent, though the laboratory work-up verifying the event included my own samples of painful vomiting. Or of having vomited painfully. Either way works.
In any case, less than a minute after the attack, I was found on the floor by a horrified mid-western couple who had intended that morning only to enjoy a quiet bit of conversation with some orange juice and wheat toast as they planned their day ahead.
From that point, I remember my own voice alternating between rather loud screams and quietly desperate whimpers. I remember attempting to crawl out of the area as the alcove filled with people, all wishing to help while possessing not a single clue as to how that might be accomplished.
And I remember paramedics, but not much after that.
Within minutes, the ambulance had delivered me to “Methodist” which is how folks in that fine state refer to the Indiana University Health Methodist Hospital. I didn’t know that then, of course. I’d been semi-conscious during a brief exchange between my paramedics and the waiting ambulance crew. All I had heard was, “Get this guy to Methodist. Go! Go!” and frankly, that was fine with me.
Later, as I reflected upon my perceptions at the time, I was reminded of the saying, “There are no atheists in foxholes.” It’s an assertion I have always believed to be true. I still believe it, of course—the premise seems obvious.
On the other hand, having been raised as a Baptist, any presumption I might have ever made regarding denominational superiority was immediately forgotten. When the paramedic yelled, “Go! Go!” and the ambulance burst into traffic toward “Methodist”, the argument regarding sprinkling versus total emersion never occurred to me.
In the ambulance, I was intubated by an attendant who talked into a keyless microphone, presumably conversing with someone at Methodist. “I am starting morphine,” she said, “in an IV drip.”
“For God’s sake,” I practically yelled at her, “don’t drip it! Just shove the bottle down my throat or something.”
For the barest moment, she appeared to be startled. Then, laughing out loud, she called to the driver. “Did you hear what he said? He said…” But the driver had heard and was laughing as well. Their hearty giggles were a curious response to my suffering, I thought, considering the fact that I was quite obviously dying.
The attendant at my side remarked, “I’ve had this happen to me before. I’ve also had four kids. I know you’re in pain. Frankly, I’d rather have four more kids than another kidney stone.”
The morphine is making me crazy, I thought. Or she skipped me and gave it to herself. After all, I was still blind with pain and she was undoubtedly crazy. Kidney stones? Who was she trying to kid? Somebody had better be looking for nuclear warheads. Clearly, terrorists had used me for a warm-up and were now loose in Indianapolis.
At “Methodist”, a beautiful ER doctor named Julie patiently explained that I would be given a CAT scan. “I’ve never really liked cats,” I told her and she laughed.
“It’s to determine the exact size and location of your kidney stone,” she explained.
“Kidney stone,” I said. “Yeah. Okay. Fine. You know, as long as you keep the morphine IV running on ‘high’, you can look for kidney stones until Jesus comes. Meanwhile, someone needs to call the police. I didn’t see whoever did this, but they should be easy to spot. Tell the officers to look for someone walking the downtown area with a four-foot sword and a thirty-six ounce Louisville Slugger.”
The ambulance attendant was filling out forms nearby and laughed loudly. “He is very funny,” she said to Dr. Miss America and they all laughed some more.
Part II
Two days later, I left Methodist with a stent inserted near my left kidney. The stent, mercifully put in place while I was anesthetized, was deemed necessary in order to bypass a stone the medical staff assured me was only .5 centimeters in diameter. I assured them that if there actually was a stone, it was the size of the one French soldiers found in 1799 in Egypt somewhere near Rosetta.
I still wasn’t convinced, but I must confess, the lack of stab wounds on my back was confusing. Also confusing was my obvious lack of a surgical incision. How did they get the stent in? I’m still not entirely sure. If you know, please—please—keep it to yourself. I really don’t want to think about it.
I flew home and into the arms of a new cadre of doctors. Within the week, a lithotripsy was scheduled. A lithotripsy is a treatment—done under anesthesia—by which ultrasound shockwaves are used to break a stone into particles that can then be passed more easily from the body.
The word “lithotripsy” is derived from two Greek words: “litho” meaning stone and “tripsy” meaning crushed. One might wonder why they don’t just call the machine a Stone Crusher, but I suppose one would not need a medical degree in order to operate a Stone Crusher. In any case, it didn’t work. Not on me anyway.
I am evidently one of those exceptions you hear about at the end of pharmaceutical commercials. You know the kind… Though we just made this aspirin sound like it can cure cancer, the occasional side effects include immediate death, prolonged suffering before death, and pain that will make you wish for death…
I was apparently (there’s that word again) the one in a thousand guy. Despite the 3,000 hits of ultrasound shockwave (no exaggeration—that’s the number they told me after the surgery) the lithotripsy did not do what it was supposed to do.
No one knew that at the time, of course, and I was sent home after the outpatient surgery with assurances that all would be well. I was informed that I would experience a day—maybe a couple days—of mild discomfort.
11pm that night…
Discomfort? This is mild discomfort? These were the musings rumbling through my head soon after the guy with the bat and sword (having also left Indianapolis) showed up at my house. It was brutal. When my wife got the doctor on call (not my doctor, but the one on call) at about midnight, she was told, “Just give him four ibuprofen.”
I’m not sure if she thanked him for the advice or not—and she doesn’t remember—but she hung up and did not give me the ibuprofen. This, as it turned out, was a good move. The lithotripsy had not destroyed the stone. Instead, another CAT scan later revealed it had pin-balled the stone back into my kidney and I was hemorrhaging. Think about that one for a minute. I know I have…
Ahh yes. Thank you for your call Mrs. Andrews. Hmm…well, I suppose he could be hemorrhaging internally—you know, that’s what we call it when someone is bleeding to death—so I suggest
you give him four blood thinners.
As I said earlier, Polly did not give me the ibuprofen, but it wasn’t because we had any clue what was happening. She just figured, Heck…he’s had four Percocets… I’m not thinking ibuprofen will help.
At 2am, she called 911. The Orange Beach paramedics showed up quickly and even though there is more to the story, you really don’t want to hear it. I’ll skip the part about not being able to breathe for several days because of the hematoma around my kidney pressing against my left lung.
I’ll also leave out the whining I would like to do about being cold—freezing actually—for a month afterward because I lost so much blood that my hemoglobin was at an all-time low. And I was weak. Really weak.
I’d just like my experience to mean something. Therefore, with your permission, I’ll close with high points from the current info on how you can avoid kidney stones. Sure, you could Google it and find out yourself, but please…if you don’t mind, I’d like to help. So, here are a few facts from the kidney stone experts:
From Livestrong.com, an article titled Grapefruit Juice and Kidney Stones— “…ample amounts of citric acid can help prevent kidney stones from developing in the urine. Despite the fact that grapefruit juice contains citric acid, regular consumption may actually increase your risks of developing kidney stones.”
Perfect. That helps. Thanks.
From Health.Harvard.edu. The piece is Kidney Stones On The Rise— This article reveals that 19% of men 9% of women will endure kidney stones by the time they are seventy. It’s a percentage that is increasing. Under the section titled Why The Rise? we read “Another possibility is climate change…”
Of course. Why not. Climate change is to blame for everything else…
And from MayoClinic.org, the report is listed under Kidney Stones Basics & Causes— Allow me to summarize, but I will do so carefully, using quotation marks in order to signify actual quotes from the article:
There are different kinds of kidney stones. According to the folks at Mayo, knowing what kind of stone you are developing can help you decide a course of action to inhibit their growth. For instance, if you have calcium stones, they state that those are “usually in the form of calcium oxalate. Oxalate is a naturally occurring substance found in food. Some fruits and vegetables, as well as nuts and chocolate, have high oxalate levels. Your liver also produces oxalate.”
Then again, you might have struvite stones. They “form in response to an infection…These stones can grow quickly and become quite large, sometimes with few symptoms or little warning.”
Or you could be dealing with uric acid stones, which “can form in people who don’t drink enough fluids or who lose too much fluid, those who eat a high-protein diet, and those who have gout. Certain genetic factors also may increase your risk of uric acid stones.”
Perhaps you are unlucky enough to have cystine stones, the kind that “form in people with a hereditary disorder that causes the kidneys to excrete too much of certain amino acids.”
Finally, to top it all off and make everything perfectly clear, MayoClinic.org includes the category specific “Other Stones”, noting that “other types of kidney stones also can occur.”
Thank you. Now we know exactly what’s happening inside ourselves. And we know exactly what to do when we eat or don’t, drink this or that, and take less or more. Unless it is all the fault of our parents.
Someone sent me another professional article yesterday detailing the research being done into a new treatment for kidney stones. The jist of it is that (and I am not making this up) roller coasters help people pass the stones. Yeah. I can see me now: Doubled over, screaming in agony and thinking, For the love of God, I’m dying here. Can’t somebody just put me on a roller coaster?!!
Personally, I think I’ll stick with the whole sword/baseball bat thing. At this point, that scenario seems easier to prevent and a whole lot less confusing.
Andy Andrews is the New York Times bestselling author of The Traveler’s Gift and The Noticer. His latest book, The Little Things, releases March 7th. Click here to get a free download of the first three chapters now!
