#IAmASurvivor are stories from women of all walks of life, telling their stories of survival. Everybody is a survivor and all stories deserve to be told. These stories are all in their own words.
The Day I Nearly Died
It started off just like any other day. I woke up to a beautiful morning and did what I usually do when it's a great day. Make the most of it! I went to spend the day by a friends pool. It was idyllic. Reading, swimming, chatting, napping. A purrrfect day.
Until the moment everything changed.
We had left the pool and gone upstairs to watch a movie. That's when it happened.
The most excruciating headache I have ever had. So sore that I fell to the floor and screamed out loud in pain. The kind of pain I've never had and I'm a migraine sufferer so I've known pain.
I knew something was very wrong. In fact I said to my friend 'I think I'm dying'
She rushed me off to the hospital. My friend is a doctor and she suspected there was something very wrong with my brain.
She was right.
A scan revealed 2 ruptured aneurysms in my brain.
Until this day, I didn’t even know what an aneurysm was.
Now I had one.
For those of you who don’t know – An aneurysm is a balloon-like bulge of an artery wall. A ruptured aneurysm releases blood into the spaces around the brain, called a subarachnoid hemorrhage, which is life-threatening.
The chances of survival are 1 in 4.
The 1 that does survive has a 50% chance of having major brain damage. We had no idea which of these statistics I would be.
It was touch and go. I had 2 surgeries 2 days in a row. The 2nd one to implant 2 stents into my brain was successful. Then it was a waiting game.
While I waited, my life literally flashed before my eyes as if on one of those old school projector screens.
And all I felt during this whole crazy life threatening ordeal was peace.
At peace with how much love from family, friends and even strangers that I was surrounded by.
At peace with having lived my life true to the real me –being 100% authentic.
At peace with the impact I had made in the world and the legacy I would leave behind.
At peace with having spent the last 4 years of my life sharing the magic of flow with the world.
As I reflected I realised that I had none of the 5 regrets of the dying. These are:
I didn't have any of these regrets because for the last 4 years, I have lived in flow. For me that has meant:
Living my life on my terms. Doing work that I absolutely love. Not doing anything out of guilt or obligation or any other negative emotion. Spending quality time with my tribe - the people I love. Following my bliss every day - spending time doing activities that make my soul light up.
If today was your day to die, would you have any of these regrets?
If you answered YES to any one of them, take action today and change that.
You have NO IDEA when your time is going to be up.
Don’t die with any regrets!
"If we are meant to continue living on this particular planet, we must switch to a way of thinking and living that has never before existed. This is necessary because the conditions we now face as a species are utterly unprecedented. What this means is that no culture—I repeat, no culture whatsoever—can give us full instructions on how to embody this new consciousness. Since there is no cultural map, we have no alternative but to rely completely on the internal compasses we all carry in our hearts." - Martha Beck
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