The Friend From Mexico: A True Story of Surviving an Intensive Care Unit

By Apostolos Mavrothalassitis

Hello, my name is Apostolos and I was born again on the sixth of February 2009 in a hospital in Mexico. These are the somewhat intense memories from the first one and a half months of my new life.

The author had a mid-air collision with a fellow competitor at 10,000 feet while participating in the 2009 World Paragliding Championships in Mexico, as a member of the Greek National Team. Two thirds of The Friend From Mexico describes the author's near-death experience while in induced coma, and the rest of the book describes the important events while in an intensive care unit and his repatriation to Greece.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Apostolos Mavrothalassitis
• Release date: Mar 7, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310301469

Apostolos Mavrothalassitis

Paragliding was Apostolos' love and passion for over 20 years. He is a four time champion of Greece, and has participated in various international competitions as a member of the Greek National Team. His final competition and final paragliding flight was in 2009 at the World Paragliding Championship in Mexico. On the final day of the competition he suffered a mid-air collision with another pilot and as a result was comatose for 12 days. In total, he spent a month and a half in intensive care where he survived against all odds. Following the best part of a year in various hospitals, he was again released to the world as a wheelchair user. Three years since his accident he obtained the first license in Greece for a pilot with disabilities and on 2013 he became the Greek Champion of Ultralight aircrafts, not in any special category, but with the same rules as the other competiros.

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The Friend From Mexico: A True Story of Surviving an Intensive Care Unit

Apostolos Mavrothalassitis

Copyright 2014 by Apostolos Mavrothalassitis

Smashwords Edition

Translation: David J. Horn

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to www.friendfrommexico.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

www.friendfrommexico.com

Back Cover Text

Hello, my name is Apostolos and I was born again on the sixth of February 2009 in a hospital in Mexico. These are the somewhat intense memories from the first one and a half months of my new life.

The author had a mid-air collision with a fellow competitor at 10,000 feet while participating in the 2009 World Paragliding Championships in Mexico, as a member of the Greek National Team. Two thirds of The Friend from Mexico describes his struggle while others thought that he was in induced coma, and the rest of the book describes the important events while in an intensive care unit and his repatriation to Greece.

Dedication

I would like to thank all those for whom I feel enormous gratitude for helping me live, love and tell this story.

To my sons Emilios and Jason with all of my love, you are my future and increase my courage.

To my family for your continued love and support.

To my surgeon Dr. Odysseas Paxinos of Air Force General Hospital for your courage, knowledge and skills, and for giving me more quality years of life to come.

To my surgeon Dr. Mauricio Montalvo of ABC Hospital, for saving my life in Mexico.

To my anesthesiologist and ICU doctor Dr. Francisco Guadarrama Quijada of ABC Hospital, for saving my life in Mexico and holding his personal record of a patient that bled so much during surgery (and made it alive in ICU).

To my Friend From Mexico, Guilermo Lopez, for his friendship and support. Although I saw you in a strange way while in ICU, you are a valued friend.

To David, for your everlasting enthusiasm for my story, your writing skills and humor, and for laboring so hard by reading your first book in the Greek language (and subsequently translating it in English).

And finally to my companion and love Dimitra and her daughter Eva, without your persuasion, encouragement, and continued support, these memories would have been fading and lost in time.

A.M.

I would like to thank Apo who once took me paragliding. At the top of mountain he gave me some advice as he buckled his harness and mine together, When I say run, you run. And don’t stop. I stood facing down the runway, Apo stood behind me, making his last minute checks. I was poised to sprint into the air, waiting for the command. He yelled, RUN. We ran. The canopy lifted. I felt it tug at me, pull me back. I ran and kept running right off the edge of the mountain, the paraglider filling with wind. I ran and soon I was running in the air. We were flying.

D.H.

Prologue

You do not get a chance to choose the life you live, and sometimes our lives are like shifting sand, forming new mountains with time. Sometimes the mountains can be belittling, but at other times they can be awe inspiring, just like the wonderful, rising mountains in Mexico at the World Paragliding Championship in 2009, where two Greek pilots were sent to compete for the Greek National Team.

Apostolos Mavrothalassitis was one of those pilots. He was ecstatic to be participating in the championship, not only because he loved the sport to which he had dedicated himself for the last twenty years, but he was also filled with pride at the greeting the Greek pilots received. During the opening ceremony, as the teams paraded through the street, the Greek team was given an especially warm reception. At one point, mothers even pointed in their direction and explained to their children, Look, there’s a Greek.

The conditions for the competition were grueling (which is part of the magic of the sport), but the difficulties were lightened and made easier by the enthusiasm and excitement of the pilots. However, on the final day of the competition a British pilot collided with Apostolos, and as a result from the near fatal accident, Apostolos was comatose for the next two weeks. For him, time came to abrupt end and then started over again. And this is exactly how he experienced the accident and what followed: everything started over, a new beginning. But I only understood what he meant once I read this book.

This could serve as a very concise and perhaps superficial description of what happened in the 2009 World Paragliding Championship. The truth is that when the accident happened, the hospital informed his family and friends in Greece (perhaps it was a simple mistake or a complete misunderstanding) that he had been found dead. But Apostolos was very much alive, experiencing an extremely strange and bizarre reality. As he himself has even said, what he lived through subsequently (accepting his new condition) seemed like a walk in the park when compared to his experiences while in an induced coma.

By reading what he experienced, it is possible to theorize that what he describes is the psychological process for acceptance of loss (in all its forms) or even death itself: a process which is considered to encompass anger, despair, hopelessness, denial and finally acceptance. But what is revealed through The Friend from Mexico is life itself. It gives us the bigger picture; reacquainting us with what is real. Like a good friend, Apostolos is trying to help us realize the truth that when you feel as though all is lost, as though your world has fallen apart, you come to the realization that you have nothing but at the same time everything. He tells us that giving up is not an option even when we feel as though life is empty and meaningless. He reminds us that futility’s enemy is life itself.

Using simple language and style, he tells us that our only choice is life. Despite the objections and reservations of those around him, even though recalling what he experienced and writing about those experiences was an arduous task, he managed to create The Friend from Mexico. This unique book gives those who have forgotten a chance to remember, and to those who don’t know, the opportunity to learn. It takes us on a trip inside the human psyche and its modest goal is nothing short of cleansing our souls.

Athens 6/6/2010, Dimitra Ontria

THE FRIEND FROM MEXICO

What is real and what is fantasy?

Is a lunatic in an insane asylum experiencing something that is not real to him?

Our only certainty is the sensations and feelings that flood us. For all the other things that we consider real, there might come a day when a hand touches our shoulder and a voice tells us:

Wake up.

Primary School…many years before…somewhere in the back of the class…

Two children sit side by side. A boy and a girl. The little boy pulls out some blank sheets of paper from his desk. How about I tell you a story?

Sure.

He draws a small boat with two tiny people inside it. He whispers, That’s me in the front and you in the back. We’re in the sea. And over here is a cave.

The little girl is absorbed by the story and the pictures that the boy is drawing. She watches him draw a slow line, encircling the boat. Neither child pays attention to the monotonous voice of the teacher.

The little boy, satisfied with the circle around the boat says, Now we are in the cave.

The girl studies the picture with its boat, two people and the cave.

The boy draws another line. This is the ceiling of the cave. You and I are climbing to the ceiling. He draws one small figure on the ceiling. Then he draws the other figure floating in the air…almost flying.

The little girl is curious about being drawn in-flight. But then the little boy tells her Look, you slipped and are falling into the water.

The little girl, irritated with her sudden and unexpected bad fortune begins to pout, I don’t like this story. Then she adds, I don’t want to fall in the water.

Then I’m not going to tell you the story, says the little boy gathering the papers.

The little girl, watching the papers being put away, curious about her fate, tries to stop the boy from gathering the papers and apologizes.

Ok. Tell me the story.

The little boy smiles with satisfaction…

...and I suddenly find myself in China.

Around me is an enormous crowd of people, all with slanted eyes moving in different directions, pushing me along with it.

As far as the horizon, I can’t see anything other than people. No mountains or buildings or any other sort of structures. Just an endless crowd. A never-ending mob of people. And we’re all dressed in multicolored clothes, just like the colors of our toy paragliders hovering over our heads.[1]

There is a constant pushing and shoving, people bumping into one another, the toy paragliders colliding as the crowd shifts right, left, forward or backwards. These small collisions resonate throughout the entire crowd; such a pleasant sensation.

One person steps forward. He has European features, and even before I get a chance to ask his name, he speaks to me in Greek, I am Gregory. Your wife Emily thinks that you have died in Mexico in a paragliding accident.

Mexico? Impossible. I’ve never been to Mexico. I’m not even sure where Mexico is.

But before I even have the chance to ask Gregory what he is talking about, he drops another bomb on me, You were injured very badly. The first operations were a marvelous success. Unfortunately as a side effect, you have been left a mute. You must be readmitted to the hospital in order to undergo the remaining treatments. But don’t worry. This hospital has an extremely efficient and democratic procedure for admitting patients. I have spoken to all the right people and they are waiting for you.

That was the first time, but not the last, that I saw this stranger named Gregory.

*****

Mute? I try to speak and produce a strange guttural noise, something like the sound of a seal barking.

I feel something in my mouth – pressing against the top of my mouth. I probe it with my tongue. It feels like an extra layer of dry, hard skin.

I begin to cry uncontrollably. What will happen to me? How can I work if I’m a mute? How will I support my family?

But my despair is short lived. I have a sudden feeling of hope. Maybe I could write a book about my adventures, the trials and tribulations of leaving China. I can support my family with the money from the book.

But first I need to go to the hospital that Gregory told me about, so I can get better.

Some gypsy women approach me. Their paragliders are canary yellow.

The gypsies are unusually neat and tidy. Their hair is pulled back revealing their beautiful brown faces. For 100 pesos, we’ll get you to speak again.

There is nothing hurt by trying. I begin to feel optimistic again, it’s a deal.

The gypsies drift past me. They make a wide lazy turn with their toy paragliders, and approach me from the rear, flying a little lower than I am. There is an ominous krats, the sound of our paragliders crashing into each other. It seems strange, but I don’t feel any fear. In fact, an overwhelming feeling of safety washes over me. We aren’t in any danger.

They approach and whisper some words into my ears, words that I can’t understand.

I begin to feel a bit rejuvenated and I try to speak. But all I can produce is the same guttural noise, and I can still feel the fleshy mass in my mouth.

The gypsies tell me that my condition is very bad. My muteness goes deep. They have no time for me so they turn to leave.

Full of despair, I bark at them. I beckon to them with barks and yodels, signaling to them with my hands that if they help me speak I’ll give them 300 pesos.

They return. Our paragliders kiss again with the same krats; they whisper in my ears; I howl and yodel, and again they prepare to fly away, disappointed.

This time I signal to them 600 pesos. They circle back for another go. But no success.

They wash their hands of me, We’ve never seen a mute like you before. We wish you the best of luck, and with that they flew away.

I am full of despair, but I know I shouldn’t dwell on this. I need to concentrate on getting to the hospital in order to begin my other treatments.

*****

The fair and democratic system to enter the hospital involves flying in from above. Once you are a couple hundred feet above it, you have to shout your name in order to be added to the list of pilots waiting for a bed to become available.

I am high above the hospital with a multitude of other pilots, all of us looking for a little salvation. We all hope the hospital can repair our broken bodies.

I have mixed feelings. I am happy to be flying with such a large group. It is nice to have company, but at the same time there are so many people. The hospital can’t take everyone. Then I begin to feel anxious because the crowd of pilots seems to get thicker and thicker and we are high above the ground.

An oriental man flies in real close to me. Oh man, look at all these people that need to go to the hospital. They say that we’ll enter in the order that we arrive. But I bet the system isn’t fair. If you don’t know someone on the inside, you’ll never get in.

I am not at all interested in this man’s idle chit-chat and his gossip. My only worry is, being mute, how would I shout my name to be admitted in the first place?

The overcrowding was becoming unbearable. It was extremely stressful with all the paragliders colliding into one another. Around 1,500 feet below me, you could begin to make out the enormous structure of the hospital.

The pilots were restricted to approach the hospital any further, unless you shouted out your name and the hospital granted you permission to enter. So, there I was, stuck inside this traffic jam, and I had no idea what to do. I was mute…there was no way I could shout my name.

The man continued, What’s your name?

I try to speak, I managed to move my lips, but I couldn’t make a sound, not even a grunt.

Hey guys, we’ve got a mute, he shouted, laughing to the others around him.

The guy started to piss me off. So, I gave it another try. With all my might I tried to shout my name, but not a sound.

With all the effort I was making to say my own name, the guy must have been curious about what I was trying to say. He leaned into me. His ear against my mouth.

Myyyyyy naaaammmmeeeee A..PO...STO…LOS

He was delighted that he heard me speak, and he shouted out, APOSTOLOS!

Almost immediately there came an announcement from the hospital loudspeaker, Apostolos has permission to land at the hospital. All other pilots must hold their current positions.

The oriental man began to shout to other pilots around him that his name was Apostolos. He told them to clear the way so he could land at the hospital.

I felt hopeless, full of despair. Not only was I mute, but now someone else was going to take my place at the hospital. I would never get in.

You are not Apostolos, the voice of the hospital loudspeaker boomed.

The man was afraid and tried to justify his descent, No…I’m not Apostolos, but…but he’s mute and he asked me to tell you his name.

Tell him to land, said the hospital.

I didn’t waste any time. I started to descend. I came close to the man, and I saw his face. He was no longer mocking. He looked at me with hatred and bitter envy.

It seems that you are one of those people with friends in high places, he spat.

I didn’t hear anything else. I left the cyclone of pilots circling the hospital behind me.

Even though I was still very far from the hospital, it was able to project images directly to me. I looked down and I could clearly see a doctor with European features, in the middle of a surgery, drenched with sweat, and an empty bed waiting for me.

What a strange system, I thought just before I fell asleep.

*****

I woke to the sound of shrieking voices and loud music, and I found myself amidst a vast group of paragliders, like a million butterflies high above a pagoda that was as imposing as a mountain.

"Here is the best mojo," screeched the voices of the paragliders simultaneously.[2]

I was swept away by feelings of tremendous joy and enthusiasm. I felt ecstatic, and I began to whirl like crazy along with the cloud of paragliders, I couldn’t resist and I wanted to fly with them and try to find the best mojo too.

The pilots were all wearing ultra modern, multicolored outfits with the most cutting edge equipment - aerodynamic helmets