Next Up: A Red Porsche and a Himbo Named Kurt

Hi, my name is Colleen, I'm 33 years old and I'm having a mid-life crisis.

Here's the deal:

As you know, on December 30, I almost died. Not to be a drama queen, but that's the long and the short of it. I was diagnosed with "significant" bilateral pulmonary emboli (PE) -- in other words, a bunch of large blood clots stuck in both of my lungs, products of a mother clot in my leg caused by recent foot surgery. As one doctor put it with a very solemn look, it's "a lot of clot." This put my heart under extreme pressure, made my chest hurt, stopped large parts of my lungs from functioning, almost stopped my breathing, made me lose consciousness. It was unfun -- actually, that's an understatement: it was terrifying. It IS terrifying.

The fact is that more than 25% of people with PEs die in the first 60 minutes of the PE lodging; many die instantly. I'm lucky that I got to the hospital and was immediately tested and medicated; I'm grateful to be alive.

I am also, for the first time in my life, acutely aware that I am afraid of dying.

I totally get that there is some irony in the little goth chick, she who loves Halloween and skulls and the dark side of things, finally fearing death. The PE issue has made me realize that yes, I am mortal. REALLY mortal. So is James. So are all the people I love. And I finally, truly am beginning to understand what "mortality" really means.

Today my chest hurts, and breathing is a little harder that I would like. A nurse was here to check me out and all looks good: BP is great, pulse is normal, lungs are clear, heart is good. My doctors said I would have both good and bad days as clots dissolve and things move and try to heal, and I expect this is one of the bad days. A little part of me, though, is scared that this means I'm worse, that all the meds I'm on aren't working. A little part of me wonders if I'm really going to make it through this whole thing alive. In a very real, very visceral way I know that I am no longer the invulnerable person I once was.

Everyone says that I'm handling things well, that I still have my sense of humor and a good perspective: my reply is thank you, I'm really trying. I believe deeply that good thought leads to good action, so a facing this optomistically is crucial. However, I have to admit that it's hard. I just really want someone to say to me, "Col, everything is going to be OK. YOU are going to be OK." I have these little flashes of awareness, all throughout my day, that I'm ... vulnerable. Fragile. Damaged. That life is so, SO much more fleeting, finite, that I had ever imagined (had I ever thought about it at all?) and all I am doing is clinging on by my fingernails and hoping I'll make it to the next sunrise.