The end of the beginning

As i have said April 12 2015 started as any other Sunday, a 7 km swim a coffee then it changed a bit, I felt like I had indigestion when I took a bite of my scone. I felt strange, no pain and just stuck, I tried to stretch, my wife Pauline said I was very white and she would take me to the doctor. I said I am fine, she went to get the car, I moved about, leaned on the rail along the beach, saw an ambulance coming along the road, thought I should stop it, couldn't do anything, it carried on.

Pauline arrived back with the car and bundled me in and off to the the emergency at Lunn Ave. On the way we both understood I was having a heart attack, niether of us said anything.

I was very aware people died from these and I didn't want to die, I had too much yet to do. More on that later. The doctors at the emergency centre called an ambulance and got to work on stabalising me.

I was loaded into the ambulance, first time with lights and sirens, very exciting until I heard them say I was "status 1 ETA 2 minutes", I knew I had to hang on for a little longer, I didn't see my life flash before me, I thought of my time with Pauline, I thought of my grand-children and I thought of my parents, they didn't deserve to bury their oldest son.

I arrived at Auckland hospital and was wheeled down a corridor, there were about 8 people standing either side, and I thought that is nice they are getting out of my way. As I went past them the decesended on me and started working. It was all a bit of a blur, I was conscious, I was pumped full of drugs.

I then went to theatre and had a stent inserted, and the blood began to flow again, the relief was instant, the intense pain stopped and I felt almost immediatley fine, I went to the cardio ward and finally was able to see and talk to Pauline.

This was the beginning of the story, I was in hospital for over a week due to an infection in the lung as a result of the blood build-up.