There is a black void in space and time for me here. I try and try to remember but nothing comes to mind. I live these moments vicariously only through the memories of others. There were tubes placed inside of me, pushing food into my starving belly. I had lost so much of my body mass that I looked as if I were just a child.
Sepsis had set in, my body inflamed and my mind muddled. My family longing to touch me, to show that they were there, but were at a standstill due to my dangerously rising heart rate. Terror still lingered as the scales of life tipped in and out of my favor. While my right limb had already been claimed by the tracks, there was hope in the air that my left could be salvaged. Surgery daily left me weak, forever in a haze of anesthesia and narcotics.
Blood is pumping through my veins, though it isn’t mine. I picture small, red blood cells backpacking across the map of my body. Tirelessly carrying the oxygen that my lungs so badly needed and with their forces, eliminating the toxic waste that had taken over my body.
My once collapsed lungs are now taking in the heavy air that surrounds me and the breathing tube that once held my life is taken out. I can breathe again on my own. The ferocious fight of living and dying has yet to end and the sun shines down on myself and my family, because, yet again, I get to live another day.