There are so many things to love about owning your own small business; no boss, making a product you’re passionate about, working directly with your customers… One perk that I unfortunately needed to take advantage of this summer was being able to drop everything to deal with one of life’s bombshells.

Our little family had just returned from a trip abroad (yes, taking time off for three-week family vacations is also a huge perk) on June 27th. Matt, Inge and I had been home for about 24 hours when we turned in for bed at about midnight on the 28th after a long jet-lagged day. Matt fell asleep within minutes and at about 12:30 I was just barely drifting off myself. I was awoken by a strange noise from his side of the bed. Matt isn’t much of a snorer, but he was making some strange labored breathing sounds that caught my attention. When I turned to face him I saw that he was actually gasping for breath and starting to struggle, although he wasn’t actually awake. When a couple of seconds later the struggling led to him falling off the side of our bed, I knew that something was very, very wrong.

Lights were flipped on as I ran over to help him. His eyes were half open and glazed, and I found myself almost robotically dialing 911. As coherently as I possible gave our address and explained the situation. He was still gasping for breath every five seconds or so, but it was obvious he wasn’t getting enough oxygen. I desperately did a quick sweep of his throat to check for foreign objects and found nothing. Knowing that help was on the way, I ran downstairs and opened both entrances to our house, leaving the doors wide open for the paramedics and EMTs. Back in our bedroom, he was turning purple. Desperate for something to help the situation, I started CPR. I was only about 30 seconds in when I heard the medics calling from downstairs. A few seconds later our bedroom was filled with seven incredibly efficient men and women that I gladly allowed to take over the situation. CPR was continued, vitals were checked, a tube was inserted into his throat and we all stood back while the defibrillator delivered its 700 volts. Even with seven people in the room working, there was still a job to be done: I held the flashlight.

They managed to stabilize him in the next few minutes and Matt was whisked out of the house. I saw his eyes flicker as they took him down the stairs, but he didn’t seem at all alert. Thankfully, one of my neighbors offered to keep an eye on sleeping Inge while another drove me the four short blocks to our local ER, almost running a red light directly in front of a police car. I always had the close proximity to a hospital in the back of my mind, but I never counted on it actually saving one of our lives.
I arrived at the ER and was ushered into a small waiting room. I called Margaret, my mother-in-law to let her know what had happened. She normally lives across town here in Chicago but that week was spending time with her two-week-old grandson in Massachusetts. Matt’s family is full of medical doctors. Margaret is a retired pediatrician and geneticist. George, Matt’s father, is an infectious disease specialist who even though is technically retired, is still sought after for advice and does the world circuit for lectures and conferences. Andrew, Matt’s younger brother, is an incredibly competent internist who has been practicing for about four years. Margaret was staying at Andrew’s house when I called, so I knew that she would quickly sound the alarm to the rest of the family.

I’m honestly not sure how long I waited in that little room. Perhaps 15 minutes, perhaps over an hour…. it was a tough intermediary time when I wasn’t sure if Matt was even still alive. At one point I stepped out and asked a nurse if I would be able to see him soon. She pointed to a room with a closed curtain and told me that the doctor was still with him, and that she would speak to me in a few more minutes. Just knowing that a doctor was treating him and not being moved to the morgue was a relief at that point. I got myself a cup of coffee and pulled out my phone again. We had a health insurance payment due in two days, and paying online seemed like a smart move instead of chancing a check arriving in time with snail mail. Yes, these were the mundane things going through my mind.

The doctor arrived. I pulled out a small notebook to record all of her medical jargon, but all I ended up writing were two words: Cardiac Arrest. His heart had stopped working for no apparent reason. She asked me a lot of questions about our recent travels, anything Matt was complaining of earlier in the day, Matt’s general health and habits. The thing was, up until that night Matt had been the picture of health. He didn’t smoke, wasn’t overweight, biked and walked around town regularly, ate well… this just didn’t make sense. She led me to his room and left me alone with Matt and his nurse, also named Matt. Nurse Matt explained that they were starting induced hypothermia, a treatment that was very new and would help reduce any swelling of the brain. To undergo the treatment, he was completely sedated so that his body wouldn’t respond as it normally would and shiver to heat him back up. This meant that he was breathing with the help of a machine, felt as cold as ice and looked like we was packed into a human-shaped cold pack. He seemed more dead than alive, but he was getting medical attention, which was still a relief after the shock of seeing him barely breathing in our bedroom.

He was moved to the ICU and while he was getting settled his family started calling. They were all on the way. While I was happy to know that there would soon be a personal medical team to help him, it was also scary to know that the situation was so dire that the family had booked flights at four am just to sit here with me. I was trying to be optimistic, but these were medical professionals. I knew things must be very, very bad for everyone to arrive on such short notice.

The next day went by in a blur. The house was filled with family, seven-month-old Inge was in heaven with so many adoring visitors, we ate, we laughed, we were all still in shock. At the hospital, nurses dashed in and out of Matt’s room while he patiently froze and then thawed out over the next 24 hours. He was still alive. This was good. The next step was to see if he had brain damage. Andrew, who was the most up-to-date of the medical Sibers, told us about the wonders of induced hypothermia. We all hoped for the best.

It had now been about 36 hours since the cardiac arrest. We all arrived early on the second morning to see how Matt would fare at a regular 98.6 degrees. The hospital staff had slowly been heating him up all night and the plan was to start taking him off of his sedatives so that his body could resume its normal functions without the help of machines. At about 9:00 am, he was moving his arms and legs a little bit and was able to open his eyes slightly. He didn’t seem to fully focus on us, but he was trying to make eye contact. Over the next couple of hours, we watched as he came out of sedation. He struggled against the machines, becoming agitated enough that the nurses had to put on a pair of ridiculous looking mittens, preventing him from pulling out any of his tubes or wires. It was difficult to see him uncomfortable, but Andrew and his doctor explained that they needed to be sure he was able to breathe on his own when the tubes came out of his lungs.

He was now able to respond to us when we talked to him, but unable to talk back. He could squeeze fingers and blink upon request, which seemed like a fantastic sign. At one point after being in the hall, I walked into his room and up to the head of the bed. By now, his sedatives had worn off enough that he was able to focus on us. He looked directly into my eyes and mouthed the word “hi.” For me, the relief in that moment was huge. There was something about this tiny exchange that confirmed so much for me. I knew that look. This was still my husband, he knew who I was, and he absolutely still loved me.

The breathing tube was out shortly afterward. It was a bit shocking to see how much tubing was actually inside of him, and I can only image how strange it must have felt to pull it out. The effort must have been exhausting for Matt, because as soon as it was all out he collapsed back on the bed and shut his eyes. But we weren’t going to let him rest so quickly. Margaret, who had been standing bedside, rushed up to him.

“Matt, Matt!” He opened his eyes briefly and turned his head towards her. “Do you know who I am?” He nodded and closed his eyes again. As he rested his head back on his pillow, he whispered an exhausted “Mom.” Margaret did a silent cheer next to his bed and we all smiled. Big, eye watering smiles. Things were looking good.

Over the next four or five days, we tried to have someone there with him at all times. He knew who he was and who we were, but he was pretty hazy on other details. He absolutely could not absorb how he ended up in the hospital. We explained what had happened to him several times a day, but it seemed that every time you asked him where he was he had a different story. On the evening of day two he was in a Russian hospital recovering from a gunshot wound. On day three he was with his Dad in South Africa (and very impressed that some friends came all the way there to visit him). On day four he was with me off the coast of Florida, then on Catalina Island in California, then further north on a boat in the Pacific off the coast of Oregon. The island theme continued on day five when he explained that he was on “Baseball Island,” in the baseball hospital. I asked if he was a baseball player. “Yeah, but not a very good one.” In fact, he was such a bad baseball player that he couldn’t recall what position or team he played for. By day six he was reluctantly admitting that he was in Chicago, but seemed to say it only to appease us. His mind was still drifting, but his short-term memory was returning enough that he knew this was what we wanted to hear.

His total hospital stay that first round was 16 days. It was a long time. His memory slowly (or quickly depending on who you talk to) returned. By the time he returned home all that was missing were a few days prior to the cardiac arrest and the week after, which included the visits from his family and his entire stay in the ICU.

While he was there, doctors were able to find a heart irregularity called Long QT Syndrome. Long QT doesn’t normally lead directly to cardiac arrest with no prior symptoms, but it seemed Matt’s case was special. He also had low levels of potassium and magnesium, which may have exacerbated the Long QT. We still don’t have the full picture, but we’re working on it with various specialists. He came home on July 15th with an external defibrillator vest. This was a temporary precaution to help us both rest easier. His internal defibrillator/pacemaker was surgically installed a couple of weeks later.

There have been some pretty big bumps in the recovery process. On August 28th he took another ambulance ride after having severe chest pain and a fainting and vomiting spell in our house. This episode was incredibly worrying for me. Just when I had begun to process the fact that Matt was back at home and appeared to be making a full recovery, I find him unconscious on the floor again. This time as soon as I went to start CPR I swear I felt a tiny tingle in my fingers as his pacemaker kicked his heart back to a normal pace. He was conscious again within seconds and I sat on the bathroom floor with my pale and clammy husband while the ambulance arrived. I definitely had to collect myself for a few minutes before walking over to the ER to meet up with him. In the hospital, we quickly discovered that this had not been another cardiac arrest. He continued to lose consciousness and vomit in the hospital at hour intervals most of that night, but this slowed down with the help of anti-nausea medications and a dopamine drip.

The next morning, his cardiologist came to visit. She discovered that one of the small wire leads from his defibrillator had punctured the wall of his left ventricle, causing a slow bleed out that was now restricting his heart from pumping fully. This issue was likely caused by Matt resuming normal life a little too quickly, and is a fairly rare complication that occurs in a little less than 1% of pacemaker and internal defibrillator recipients. The next morning he was back in for surgery to drain the blood and move the wire lead back into place. After an additional two weeks in the hospital (he had to make a return visit due to extra fluid buildup), he is taking his recovery much more seriously.  No more teaching this semester, and a full six weeks of restricted use of his left arm, which means not being able to help much with our 11-month-old daughter.

And how have this wife and caretaker fared? After his second trip to the ER, I almost felt like I was given an emotional do-over. This is difficult to explain, but feeling like he was so close to death again allowed me to deal with things in a different, more powerful way. The shock of his initial cardiac arrest was completely numbing emotionally, and in retrospect I understand that this was necessary. There is no way that I could have fully dealt with all of that and remained functional.

Three months since the initial event, I’m still sorting through my near-loss. I’m sure I will be for a very long time. I’m completely exhausted being a temporary single parent and trying to keep my little business running through the holiday season. When I’m able to relax with him, Matt says I look at him suspiciously, not believing him when he tells me he is feeling good. Seeing him asleep can be troubling. I often make sure I can see or hear him breathe when I wake up in the middle of the night. But every day he improves, the more I relax.

Although I am sure I’ll be processing this event for many years to come, there are a few things that I’m certain of. I have heard that during near-death experiences, people revisit parts of their lives and sometimes have regrets. As I watched Matt laid out in the ER that first night, unsure if my husband would live or ever be exactly the same mentally, I was relieved to feel absolutely no regrets about our time together. If I could go back and live the five years of our relationship over again, I don’t think I would have changed a thing. Thinking about the absolute heartbreak of losing him, the thought at the front of my brain was “It was worth it.” I knew I was lucky when I met Matt. Now that he has made it into the fortunate 5% to survive a sudden cardiac arrest, I have that luck times 100. Thankfully, life goes on in the Siber house.