The Spiral Into Darkness (Part 3)

The start of 2026 was chaotic. First and foremost, it was a transition year for me. My 75^th birthday arrived in April, and I wasn’t ready for the milestone. Terry and I were stressed on a number of different fronts. The picture-perfect yacht of our life that we lived and enjoyed was suddenly rudderless.

Our lives were unravelling, and we struggled with decisions that should have been easy to make. We spent the winter in Florida, but were involved in fewer activities than during the heyday of our 60’s. The political situation in the USA was very stressful to deal with, and we seriously weighed the pros and cons of going or staying home in Canada. In the end, we took off to Spain for 5 weeks to visit and consider that country as a future winter option.

Another quirk; Our home in Canada was 10 years old, and maintenance was overdue, including gardening, levelling paving stones and increasing repairs and replacement of machinery around the pool. It is a beautiful yard, meant to be maintenance-free. Nothing is maintenance-free.

We lost good friends in 2026, some through the normal diseases of our time, others unexpectedly. While on our annual visit to Manitoba, we took a side trip to Reston, Manitoba to attend a celebration of life for long-time friend and Regina to visit a couple who were neighbours during our time in Winnipeg. The visit was a wonderful reminiscence of our shared history. A week later, they were both killed in a tragic accident. The loss was devastating and just another reminder of our overall vulnerability.

But underlying every stressor was my health. I had run out of options, and my body was tired from the growing exertion of breathing across progressively restrictive vocal cords and the escalating risk of choking. Swallowing was becoming more difficult, and food was getting caught up in my throat. I was losing weight that I couldn’t gain back. I had no appetite, and what I did eat took me a long time to consume.

On Sunday, September 13^th I awakened at 4 AM, exhausted and fearful. My back was against the wall; I had nowhere else to go, no options to consider, except dying! Terry came into the room.

“I need to go to the hospital,” I croaked.

“I’ll call an ambulance,” she replied.

Our town is blessed with a small but modern hospital, 5 minutes from our house, and the care and attention that I received there was both professional and caring. But my condition was too critical for their limited resources. I needed to be transferred to Ottawa. That decision posed another problem: would I make it there?

A medical team with L’Ornge critical care ambulance service drove to our hospital and consulted with the Almonte medical team. A senior anesthesiologist was also dispatched for his ENT experience. Their arrival and team chemistry created an electric energy focused on a major transport decision: did I need to be intubated for the 30-minute lights-and-sirens ambulance ride?

And while it was pretty awesome to watch the synergy of the situation, they were working to mitigate the risks to my health and safety in the next half hour.

Scary that I had risked so much, but humbling that so much time and effort was focused on my safe delivery to a final destination.