Beep-Beep!! Danny Jones R.I.P.

Day before yesterday, my dear sweet friend Danny Jones passed away. I met Danny in 1993 in AA when I started going to meetigs in Milan, Tennessee. He was one of the first people to come up to me and introduce himself and welcome me to the group. He was one of the sweetest, funniest, most kind hearted people I have ever known. I would go to Greenfield and pick him up and take him to meetings or take him home afterwards because he didn't drive.He would reach over when I least expected it and goose me in the ribs yelling "BEEP-BEEP!!" And that would scare the crap out of me!! One night he did that and I almost ran off the road! He had had several strokes and heart attacks and lost a lot of his memory so he lived with his mother and did not drive. His mother was always watching what he ate and he was always sneaking food in that he was not supposed to be eating. He asked my sister and her husband at the time to bring him some B-rite chicken and put it in the mailbox one night and stood outside eating his mailbox chicken. One time he had a minor heart attack (is there really any such thing?) and was in the hospital in Martin when I was living there and going to school. He had called while I was at a meeting and left a message on my answering machine. He sounded terrible and desperate. "Terrie, please call me when you get home!!" I called him and he said "Yeah can you run over to Tony's before they close and get me a pizza with everything on it and bring it to me??" LOL I thought something was terribly wrong like another heart attack and he wanted a midnight pizza delivery to the CCU at the hospital!! I called the nurses desk and they said I could bring it so I took him a pizza at midnight. He had us also smuggle in a bag of O'Boisies potato chips while his mom was there and when she was in the bathroom we hid them under his night stand! He was always doing crazy stuff like that. There was a campout every year at Paris Landing and he rented a room at the hotel and let me and my daughter stay with him. I was in charge of giving him his meds. He grabbed the container and took what I thought was the whole days worth at one time!! Scared me silly! It was just one does of each med but man I was wigging! He was just so funny and so sweet and good hearted and my heart is hurting right now but I have so many funny memories of him. He will be missed. I loved him and pray his family has as many funny stories and memories as I do to comfort them.

Hallucinations and Crazy Thoughts in the ICU

Ok so in 2009 I was in the hospital after having bowel obstruction surgery. I was having trouble breathing so the doctor's first thought was they were over medicating me, which is just silly since I am a recovering addict with super tolerance. Soooo they gave me narcan which sucks all the narcotics out of your system at once. I've been on pain meds for years (at the time I was wearing a fentanyl patch). I had a seizure and the hallucinations began. I thought I went through some kind of horrible portal to a place called Orgrimmar (a place in world of warcraft) where everyone looked like the people from Avatar (waaaay before avatar came out with previews) then they realized I had flash edema, and my lungs were full of fluid. My O2 was at 68. That's when they took me to the ICU and I began a weird journey into crazy town. I decided they were stealing my pain meds and giving them to Michael Jackson who was dead. I thought his kids stole my nephew. There was a troop of tiny circus performers living under my bathroom tiles and I was in Afghanistan at one point talking to my IV pole and heart monitor because they were soldiers guarding me. The fan kept telling me the nurses were tricking me.I kept asking where all the cats came from and then I thought I had to fart....it wasn't a fart. I crapped all over the bed and told the nurse "I think that chili made me sick! " I hadn't eaten in two weeks. I finally came to, tied to the bed with blood on my hands. I asked Barry if I had a psychotic break and he said no you just kept trying to get up to go find your nephew. All the while my lips were cracked and bleeding (hence the blood) and stuck to my teeth my hair standing on end and eyes bugging out. Barry said when I asked how I looked "Horrifying " lol. What's weird is though I know they were hallucinations, they still seem like real memories....